Harry Potter & The Daughter of Malfoy
by Fyrie
Summary: Harry Potter gets in the way of a pregnancy potion meant for Narcissa Malfoy, leaving the boy-wonder pregnant. He's not best pleased! How is he meant to save the world from Voldemort when he has to go on maternity leave? (NOT slash - just silly) COMPLETE
1. Knocked Up

Chapter One - Knocked Up

"You bloody idiot!"

"How was I meant to know the little fool would be coming in and collide with me, Severus? You could have warned me!"

"If you and your wife could simply perform procreation like any other couple, this would never have happened!"

Harry Potter pressed his eyes tightly shut, wondering why his brain had decided that now was a good time to return to consciousness, two men arguing nearby and one of them clearly Severus Snape, his least favourite Professor.

It also raised the question of why the hell he was lying in a bed.

In a place that smelt like the potions classroom.

The last thing he could remember was being on his way to Snape's dungeon, for yet another detention, and he had collided with a larger figure as he had sulkily stormed into the room.

He could vaguely remember a flash of blond hair, then the smash of a bottle and something cool and wet soaking through the front of his robes. And cursing. There had been quite a lot of loud cursing.

Then black.

Wincing, he felt a burning in his groin, suggesting that he really needed to go to the toilet soon. Ah. That was why consciousness had decided to bring him back. So he wouldn't embarrass himself even more.

Opening his eyes, he groaned as he started to sit up, feeling strangely tired.

His surroundings were dark, illuminated by a strange, green, flickering light, the walls black like those of the dungeon and the bed he was lying on, equally so, with dark blankets and sheets.

"Potter!"

Snape was looming over him in a heartbeat, grasping the boy's shoulders and staring down at him with...

Harry blinked.

Was that fear and concern?

On Snape's face?

He must have hit his head or something…

"Wh-what happened?" he asked nervously, while hoping he could contain the urge to pee in vast quantities. 

"You were a clumsy little fool who wasn't looking where he was going," the second voice put in angrily, pulling Harry`s attention from the rather scary expression of wary concern on Snape's face. "And now, you've wasted my time in coming here."

At the sight of the man beyond Snape, Harry felt the colour draining from his face.

"M-Malfoy..."

"So you recognise me, boy?" Malfoy's lip curled. "Pity you didn't, when you barged into me and spilled my potion."

"Lucius, hold your tongue for a moment," Snape snapped.

Harry was feeling queasy and a little frightened. Where was he? Had he been caught by the Death Eaters? Why was everything so dark? And why the hell did he feel so bloated and uncomfortable?

Turning his face away from Malfoy's glaring features, Harry looked nervously back at the Potions Professor, who was sitting on the edge of the bed beside him, studying him with concern.

"Where am I?"

"My chambers, Potter," A bony hand touched his brow, then his throat, Snape's dark brows puckering together. "And I'm afraid I may have some...rather bad news for both of you."

"Aside from the fact that my potion that I paid for is wasted?"

"Not wasted, Lucius," Snape replied seriously, although he did - in fact - look like he wanted to laugh. "Your second child has been conceived and will be born, only..." He gave Harry a pained look. "Congratulations, Mister Potter. You're pregnant."

The loud cursing started up again and Harry wondered if it was the warning that unconsciousness was impending.

Apparently, it was in this case.

***  


"So, to protect herself, Narcissa desired to be pregnant?"

Lucius Malfoy was scowling mutinously at Albus Dumbledore, ignoring Harry completely. "Everyone knows that You-Know-Who never harms pregnant women, muggle, witch or otherwise. Narcissa simply wished to utilise it for her benefit."

Dumbledore's voice was neutral and strangely patient. "And you disliked the idea of natural conception so much, you resorted to Severus and his abilities to provide a child for you?"

Malfoy said nothing.

Harry was sitting in a chair opposite Dumbledore, looking down at his hands, still trying to come to terms with what he had just been told.

He was pregnant.

There were several reasons that that was just plain wrong. A. He was most definitely male. B. He hadn't even had sex yet, let alone be carrying his arch-nemesis' father's child. C. He was seventeen and meant to save the world from the evil Lord Voldemort. How was he meant to do that if he had to take maternity leave?

Plus, he was starting to wonder about his whole `lacking in storage facilities' for a child, if he really was knocked up.

Although, his nipples had started getting rather sensitive, since the night before...

He reddened at the thought.

"Sir," he asked carefully. "Is...is it possible?"

"That you are magically conceived of a child? Unfortunately yes, it is true Harry."

So much for looking handsome and streamlined by the time it got to the time for the yearbook photographs.

"Bugger."

It seemed a good thing to say. 

"So, what do we do now?"

Lucius Malfoy was the one the voiced the question. 

"Well, I suppose Harry will return to his friends and explain the situation, then carry the child to term." 

"Carry it?" Harry squeaked.

"I'm afraid a magical pregnancy could not be terminated, Harry, although you ought to know that a magically enhanced pregnancy is somewhat advanced and will only last four months."

"And that's my child your talking about," Malfoy added dangerously, his silver eyes flashing. "You'll carry that infant to term, as a punishment for being such a clumsy little fool."

He couldn't say why, but somewhere in his mind that sounded like a horrible thing to be called and his eyes brimmed over with tears that spilled down his face, although he couldn't help feeling confused.

He didn't cry.

It was the rule! 

The Boy-Who-Lived didn't cry!

"There there, Potter," Snape offered a handkerchief, which Harry took and dabbed his eyes delicately with. Dabbed his eyes? What was he? A bloody girl? "I'm afraid your hormones are adjusting already."

"Hormones?"

As if dealing with the issue of pregnancy wasn't enough...

"Ah..." Even Dumbledore looked a little uncomfortable, which was doing nothing to reassure Harry, who was feeling like he would burst into floods of tears at the slightest thing. "Yes, that is a rather unfortunate side-effect. You will acquire some of the... emotional aspects of an expectant mother."

"But I'm not a girl!"

"We had noticed this minor fact, Potter," Malfoy growled. "Stupid little..."

Harry couldn't hold it in.

A wail of misery escaped him.

"Lucius," Snape hissed. "That really wasn't very helpful."

"And you expect me to be all hugs and puppies, Snape?" Grey eyes flashed angrily at the Potions professor. "That boy is carrying the child my wife wanted simply because he couldn't look where he was going!"

Blinking back tears, Harry felt anger rising in him. Anger more focussed, intense and powerful than anything he had ever felt before in his life and he surged to his feet, storming towards Lucius Malfoy.

"How dare you imply that this was entirely my fault, you hypocritical son of a bitch! HOW DARE YOU!" Jabbing his finger at the centre of Malfoy's chest, he heard himself shouting and wondered where this spectacular temper had come from. "You blame me for this child! You're the one that put this bloody thing in me! You're the one who didn't take more precautions! You're the one who can't sleep with his wife and left me with this...THING! You're being such a   
bloody...MAN!"

There was a rather speechless silence.

Harry mentally went over the words in his head.

Dear God, he really did sound like a cheesed off pregnant woman.

Lucius Malfoy was gaping at him, mouth open.

Snape was snickering behind a hand, black eyes glinting with mirth.

Dumbledore was staring up at the ceiling, as if fascinated by a spider spinning a web there, but Harry had the oddest feeling that he, too, was amused.

Sitting back down, he awkwardly cleared his throat and smoothed the front over his stomach, here he could already feel a swell developing. He really was pregnant. He was carrying a Malfoy baby.

And he thought facing a Basilisk was bad.

"What do I do now?" he asked in a small voice.

"I'm sure the Gryffindors will understand," Dumbledore said sympathetically.

"Like hell they will!" Malfoy exploded angrily, vivid red spots appearing on his pale cheeks. "There is no way that the boy carrying my child is going to spend any time with filthy Gryffindors!"

"I'm a Gryffindor, you ignorant bastard!" Harry yelled back, his voice ringing with tears again. Malfoy actually flinched away at the vehemence in his tone. "Don't you even THINK about calling them names!"

Wow.

These mood swings were really kind of fun!

"So, what do you suggest?" Malfoy finally asked, not even meeting Harry's eyes. "I would rather keep the...surrogate nearby, lest anything should happen and since the boy is pregnant, the Dark Lord is liable to leave him alone."

"You mean," Harry interrupted. "If I'd been knocked up every year, Voldemort wouldn't have come after me?"

Snape and Dumbledore exchanged looks that clearly said "Now why didn't we think of that?"

"I ought to take him to the Manor. Narcissa will want him nearby."

"Like hell!"

"Mister Potter, that is the father of your child you are speaking to."

Harry blinked. "Don't say it that way," he said, a nauseous look crossing his face. "It sounds so...wrong."

"Unfortunately, it's true," Malfoy muttered. 

"Which means that you can't hurt me, unless you want your wife to hurt you," Harry smirked. The look on Malfoy's face suggested that he was right and he smirked a little bit more.

"Mister Potter," Lucius Malfoy's voice had taken on a pleading note. "I assure you that you will have everything at your convenience, if you come to the Manor. Narcissa will see to your every need. You cannot remain here."

"And if I do?"

"I would be forced to put you in a full body-bind and take you there by force," It was said casually, although without malice. "I'm afraid my wife is rather possessive of her offspring, be they surrogate or not."

"Brilliant," Harry mumbled, turning to Dumbledore. "Sir...?"

"I hate to agree with a known Dark Wizard, Harry, but I'm afraid Mister Malfoy may be right in this situation. You can study there and be guaranteed safety," he said, getting to his feet. "Not only will you be under the protection of the Manor, but under the protection of Narcissa."

When all three older men shuddered at that, Harry wondered if he should try and make a run for it.

"Then, it's settled," Malfoy said, looking utterly disgusted. "Potter, you will come to the Manor and carry that child to term. No one need ever know that someone other than Narcissa bore a Malfoy child."

"Mister Malfoy, just so you know, I don't like you."

"And you were under the impression that I had an emotional attachment to you, simply because I left you pregnant?" There was a pause, then Malfoy shuddered, a nauseated look on his face. "And there are so many reasons that sounded wrong..."

Harry got to his feet, one hand coming to the base of his back, which was aching. "I hate my life," he muttered, as Dumbledore gave him a conciliatory smile of apology, which made him really wish he knew how to do the Cruciatus curse.

Seventeen, unmarried, pregnant and expected to save the world...

Life as a teenager wasn't easy.


	2. Mood Swing

Chapter Two - Mood Swing

"What do you mean you're going away? What about the exams?"

"Bollocks to the exams!" Ron interrupted Hermione's spiel urgently. "What about the Quidditch Tournament? We're winning! We can't exactly win if we don't have a seeker, can we?"

Harry looked down at his stomach, which had already started to swell outward, then tried to imagine himself keeping his balance on a broom, while pregnant. All in all, it wasn't a pleasant picture, although, he would be the first to admit it looked hilarious.

"I don't have a choice," he replied glumly. "Dumbledore says I have to go. For my own protection."   
Although that did raise the question of who was protecting and whom would be protected. Something told him Narcissa Malfoy wouldn't exactly be thrilled to learn that the baby concocted for her was now in the body of a seventeen year old boy.

Hell, he wasn't even thrilled about it!

When Dean had said his new robes were fitting a bit better the night before, he had simpered and acted like a bloody nancy! Then, Seamus had commented that they looked a bit tight around the middle.

Seamus, he thought smugly, wouldn't be walking straight for at least a week.

"Where is it you're going anyway?"

Harry bit his tongue.

It didn't seem like a good idea to say "I'm going on temporary maternity leave to stay at Malfoy Manor because Lucius Malfoy - the inconsiderate git - knocked me up in the potions lab and now, I'm expecting his baby."

Mention of Malfoy, knocking up, baby and potions lab were all on his list of "Things not to say" that Dumbledore had kindly provided him with, before he left the office, along with a list of "Believable explanations". 

"Somewhere four star, so I can take the weight off my feet," he said hopefully. "And with a swimming pool and jacuzzi..."

Ron and Hermione stared at him incredulously.

"What? I've saved the bloody world six years in a row and looked glamorous and macho while doing it and now, when I get the chance to have a break, you don't think I should get the best winter break money can buy?"

"Um..." Wisely, Ron took several back-steps until he was safely out of range of Harry's foot. Apparently he had heard what had happened to Seamus. From Seamus, no doubt, as everyone in the school had heard.

The squeal had probably been heard on the far side of the Dark Forest.

"What Ron means is that we would feel better if we knew you were safe!" Hermione interceded quickly. "I mean, what's the point of having a jacuzzi if You-Know-Who shows up?"

Harry shrugged. "He might like it and get distracted by the bubbles."

Ron blinked, a nauseated look crossing his face. Hermione's eyes went very wide.

Harry recalled what he had just said and was suddenly struck by the rather...odd image of Voldemort in speedos.

It wasn't pleasant.

"I think you need a break, Harry," Hermione said faintly, shaking her head, as if to dislodge whatever image she had gotten lodged there.

Which basically translated to: You're starting to give us scary mental images with everything you say and its really rather disturbing so please go away and don't come near us again.

Well, that had been a lot easier than he had expected.

"So...breakfast, before I go?"

Hermione nodded, her face still screwed up as if she was trapped in a very scary and sickening visual place, possibly with Lord Voldemort as a scantily-clad pool boy with a bottle of suntan lotion and a seductive expression.

Ew.

Ron just squeaked.

Knowing Ron, he would be in the same mental place as Hermione, except with a lot more of him and Hermione shagging in the sidelines.

Not much was said on the way down to the Great Hall, apart from the occasional plaintive whimpering sound and mumbles of "but speedos...they...eurgh..." from Ron, who was starting to look green in the face.

On entry to the Great Hall, a figure that looked remarkably like Seamus - it was hard to tell since he was still doubled over - waddled out rapidly when Harry entered and made a beeline for the Slytherin table, which had so many more vile-looking foods on it than the savoury Gryffindor table.

Had to be something to do with them being the Evil House(tm).

Grabbing a handful of dried out pickled onions from the plate of a rather stunned Pansy Parkinson, Harry looked around, then spotted a dish of strawberry yoghurt and couldn't imagine anything that would taste better than the two combined.

Hermione made a choking sound as Harry started dipping the onions in the yoghurt and munching on them, licking his fingers after every one.

Really, it was the most delicious thing he had ever tasted...

And everyone was staring at him as if he had just eaten his own wand.

"What do you think you're doing, Potter?"

Ah...

The soon-to-be-semi-step-son.

Wonderful.

"Eating," Harry replied cheerfully, flashing a bright smile at Draco Malfoy and offering the half-full bowl of yoghurt, the blackened pickled onions bobbing on the pink surface. 

Malfoy looked like he had been hit by a two-by-four.

Then a bout of seasickness.

It really was a wonderful day, Harry mused. 

Good food. Good friends. Good enemies, who were currently vomiting in their good neighbour's lap. Good witty banter with said enemies, when they weren't in the process of puking their guts out. 

Not so good mental images, but that was fair enough. 

Everything was good.

"Are you thick in the head, Potter?" Draco spluttered, looking even more pale and pointed than usual. "You're standing at the Slytherin table! You know, Slytherin, the Dark Lord?"

"Don't see him here right now," Harry replied, still contentedly nibbling on the onions, green eyes shining with the...goodness of the day. Everything was shiny and happy and perfect. "Met him a few times. Doesn't look good in speedos."

Ron heaved.

Draco blinked, then was blessed - albeit slowly - with the same mental image and heaved too.

Slow on the uptake, Harry pondered, pity my kid and its genes, then.

My kid.

Uh...  
When did it become `my' kid?

"You're a bloody freak, Potter!"

Harry blinked at the tone in Malfoy's voice. All right, that was just rude and more than that, it wasn't nice. That wasn't very nice at all! He felt his lower lip start to tremble and his eyes brimming up. 

Oh bollocks, not again!

Malfoy blinked at him. "Crying, Potter?" he sneered. "You're crying aren't you?"

"I'm bloody not!" Harry wailed, then mentally cringed. Oh crap. Even worse. He had wailed. Not just the water works. A good, full blown wail.

"Yes, you are! You're crying!" Malfoy was on his feet and pointing at the very emotionally unbalanced Harry. "Potter! You're crying like a girl!"

"Stop being so nasty to me!" Harry wanted to strangle the little hormone-monster that was making him act like a bloody girl. He wanted to answer for himself and tell Draco Malfoy where he could stick his wand, but the hormone-monster had hold of his mental controls and was   
having a lot of fun.

"Did you hear that?" Malfoy laughed coldly, looking around at the other Slytherins, who took the cue and laughed along with him, although very few knew why. "Potter wants me to stop being nasty to him! Looks like he's as pathetic as his old mum and dad, after all."

Harry was shaking internally and externally with pure, white-hot anger that was flooding through his veins. 

Slowly, a wide, mad grin spread on his face.

"You're in trouble now, Malfoy..."

He could feel it building up inside of him, the incredible and overpowering anger he had felt twice since he had found out he was pregnant: once with Lucius and once with Seamus. Only, this time, it was worse. Very much worse. Malfoy had mentioned his parents. The   
only possible thing that came higher than that, at the moment at least, was Harry looking fat.

No one had said the 'f' word yet. 

Seamus had come close to it the night before.

Seamus had also felt what it was like to have his bollocks kicked up into his throat, so he wasn't considered much of a threat anymore.

But, insulting the parents...

Oh Hell, Malfoy was in for it.

"What are you grinning at, Potter? You look like a loony," Malfoy stared at him.

Harry said nothing, his mad grin widening.

Only a little more.

The pressure was building and soon...

"Look at the Gryffindor freak! Got one for St Mungo's here!"

"DRACO MALFOY, HOW DARE YOU SAY SUCH A THING!" Harry's howl of fury echoed off the walls and ceiling, rattling cutlery on the tables and making a few people of a more nervous disposition cower under their seats.

Draco Malfoy blinked and made a sound like. "Abuh...?"

"You're filthy and wretched and loathsome little git with a father with more money than fashion-sense!" Harry let the rage take him. He was grinning like a lunatic, but he didn't care at all. This was fantastic and no one, not even Dumbledore could stop it! "You prance around, acting all hard man and you're really nothing more than an insignificant jealous little wanker who just imagines fondling MY broom at night, because you know you'll never be anywhere near as good as I am on it! And don't you even think of taking that way, Parkinson!" he pointed down at the girl, who went red, then turned his attention back to Draco, who had gone a funny shade of grey. "You're jealous cos I've met your precious Dark Lord and you haven't and I'm better on a broom and I'm better-looking and I have a nicer arse! You're just a stupid little boy and if you think that insulting somebody is funny, its only because you're too stupid to see how pathetic it makes you look and YES," He pointed at Pansy again, who had opened her mouth to speak. She clapped it shut instantly. "Parkinson, I DO know that I'm being a hypocrite, but don't you even think about interrupting or I'll humiliate you too!" Leaning across the table, Harry dumped the remaining yoghurt all over Draco's perfect blond head and finished with a cold, "And you have stupid hair."

There was a stunned silence.

A tumbleweed rolled past.

The rest of the Slytherins were staring at their snobbish, arrogant and blond Leader in astonishment. Apparently, they expected him to outdo that little tirade, in his usual biting fashion.

It wasn't about to happen.

Draco blinked dribbling strands of pink yoghurt out of his eyes. His lower lip was trembling petulantly. Grey eyes filled with tears. 

Harry smirked down at him. "My work here is done," he said cheerfully, knowing that all was perfect in the world again, turning on heel and striding back off the join Hermione and Ron, who were staring at him, shell-shocked.

"Harry..." Hermione gasped.

Ron immediately grabbed Harry's hand and shook it fervently, a look of awe-struck hero-worship in his brown eyes. "That was bloody brilliant, mate. Absolutely bloody brilliant."

"But it wasn't very nice..."

"It was Malfoy, Hermione," Ron reminded her.

Gradually, a wave of laughter started, stunned and shaking, but laughter none the less. Apparently, many had wondered when the famous Harry Potter would snap and now, they had lived to witness and tell their grandchildren all about it. He just hoped it had proved   
memorable enough.

Making their way to the Gryffindor table, Harry couldn't help shooting a glance back towards the Slytherin table, where Draco was sobbing like a baby into the shoulder of the uncomfortable-looking Goyle, who was sympathetically patting the smaller boy's shoulder and trying to avoid the yoghurt.

Harry gasped.

"Oh no!" he whispered. 

"What is it?" Ron took a step away.

Green eyes that were rapidly filling with tears again turned to Ron. "I-I dumped my breakfast on his head!"

"Yeah, and?"

Hermione squealed when Harry wildly grabbed Ron by the front of his robes and shook him. Ron, for his part, looked utterly petrified. "It was my breakfast!" Harry wailed. "I want my breakfast!"

"Mister Potter," a calm and slightly amused voice spoke from behind him.

Harry spun and - for reasons he would later consider in humiliated detail - threw himself into Professor Snape's arms, wailing miserably. "Oh, Professor! Its horrible! I spilled my breakfast!"

What are you doing, Harry? 

I'm hugging Snape.

Why are you hugging Snape, Harry?

Because he's the one who knows about this mess and he can make everything all better and...what the fu...? I mean, I'm hugging him because I'm all hormonal and pregnant, you bloody stupid internal monologue!

Yes, but do you have to hug him so tight, Harry?

Um...

And do you intend to let him breathe some time today, Harry?

Harry blinked and released Snape, who uttered a feeble gasp, before keeling over, his face a funny shade of blue.

Ron looked down at him.

"Not a bad morning, then, Harry," he remarked approvingly. "You humiliate Malfoy so much that he starts blubbing like a baby and then practically kill Snape by hugging him. What have you got in mind for an encore?"


	3. Travelling

Chapter Three - Travelling

The carriage jolted over another bump and Harry Potter groaned audibly, clutching at his stomach, his face a very Slytherin shade of green as they thundered along the dark country roads.

On the opposite side of the carriage, Lucius Malfoy smirked, his hands resting atop the snake-head of his walking cane.

It was nearly three hours since Malfoy Senior had arrived at Hogwarts in a cloaked carriage, to take the surrogate 'mother' of his next infant home to his wife. To Harry, it seemed like a lot longer.

"I think I'm going to be sick."

Malfoy arched a brow. "You are improving in your whining. I almost felt concerned for you." he paused pensively. "Although, it could have been indigestion." Harry scowled at him. "Stop pulling that ridiculous face, boy. Anyone would think you had never travelled in a carriage before."

"I haven't!"

"Ah."

Harry wondered if he could actually will himself to puke copiously over Malfoy's cane, shoes and robes.

"I wouldn't think that if I were you," Malfoy suggested lazily, as if reading Harry's malevolent glare that was directed vehemently at Malfoy's shoes. "After all, we still have six hours of travel left and you would truly hate to be stuck in a box smelling of vomit, wouldn't you? Stop being childish."

Yes, it was childish, but he was pregnant for goodness' sake! He was allowed to be petty and malicious and his back was aching a lot and all he wanted was a nice soft bed and a weepie film.

Leaning against the wall of the rocking carriage, he groaned.

He was really turning into a girl.

"Why did it have to be me?" he asked under his breath.

"Because you are a clumsy little pillock who should have been looking where he was going?" Lucius Malfoy suggested helpfully, tracing a finger over the head of his cane, studying it with what looked like a deep fascination.

Harry kicked him in the shin.

"Ow!"

"Ha!"

Lucius glared at him, bending to rub his ankle. "Oh, how very mature of you, Mister Potter," he muttered. "And the old coot at the school believes that you are meant to be the saviour of our world. What are you going to do? Kick Voldemort in the shins until he dies of boredom?"

"Shut up."

"Very eloquent."

Harry settled for the most dignified response he could think of. He stuck his tongue out, folding his arms over his chest and scowling at the man sitting opposite him. "I don't like you."

"And I suppose that will ruin my deep and passionate secret crush on you, won't it?"

"Eep?"

Lucius Malfoy smirked. "You flatter yourself, boy."

"At least I don't play with my wand in public." Lucius looked up from his wand, which he was fondling, then went rather red at Harry's smirk. He hastily put it back inside his trousers and settled, instead, for toying with his cane.

Leaning forward, Harry looked out of the window at the countryside they were flying through, the four immense grey horses leading the carriage faster than any he had ever seen before.

He had no idea where Malfoy Manor was, only that it was very big and was Lucius Malfoy's pride and joy.

After his cane and his hair of course.

"Can I ask you something?"

"If I say no, you will irritate me about it for the next six hours, won't you?"

"Yep."

"Ask, then. I can't guarantee and answer."

Harry studied the man facing him. It was the first time he had received a remotely civilised word from him, which was rather...strange. Although, nothing in the present circumstances could entirely be considered as normal. "Why did you get a potion to get your wife pregnant?"

"I beg your pardon?"

Going rather red - although that was a minor response to the thought of sex in any way shape or form. No one mentioned just how horny pregnancy would make him feel. - Harry cleared his throat. "Why...er...you...you could have..."

"Spit it out, boy. If you are going to ask a question, I would rather have it out of the way before we reach the manor."

"Whydidn'tyoujusthavesexwithyourwife?"

"You wish to know why I didn't partake in conjugal relations with my wife?"

Harry blinked at the collection of rather big words. He made a note to buy himself a dictionary and possibly a thesaurus as well, but nodded nonetheless. The big words sounded impressive and accurate. 

"Tell me, Mister Potter," Lucius Malfoy laid his cane aside for a moment. "Do you find my wife attractive?"

"Um..."

"Believe me, boy, I wouldn't kill you for that particular crime," There was an odd, amused gleam in Malfoy's cool, grey eyes which made Harry feel a combination of wary suspicion and pant-wetting terror. "The hussy has a skill of attracting any man in the vicinity."

"She...er...she's very beautiful."

"Yes, she is." The mirthful glint was even more pronounced.

Harry was bemused. "So why don't you just...you know...instead of having all the potions and things made. I mean, she's gorgeous and everything, so why didn't you just...do...stuff?"

"I have my reasons."

"Reasons for avoiding shagging a gorgeous woman?"

"Yes."

"What are they?"

"She is...not to my tastes."

"Not to your tastes?"

Harry stared at the man facing him in absolute shock and disbelief. How could she, the radiant Narcissa Malfoy, not be to his tastes when he was married to her? Was he blind? Insane? Barking mad? 

He had only seen Narcissa Malfoy once and she was absolutely stunning! Stunning enough to achieve a place in the dreams of all the Gryffindor boys along with Fleur Delacour.

There was a long silence only broken by the clatter of the horses' hooves on the road beneath the carriage.

"I get it!"

"Is that so?"

"You're gay!"

Lucius Malfoy's lips twitched slightly. He almost looked like he was about to start laughing, but he looked down at his cane momentarily and his expression became the cold, emotionless one again. "I'm afraid you couldn't be more wrong, boy."

"Oh yeah? Then why do you have the poofy clothes? And the long hair? And the ribbons and everything about you! The cane! I mean, how camp can you get?" Harry pointed at him vehemently. "You have to be gay!" 

"Maybe I ought to be that way inclined, but I certainly am not," Lucius answered, smirking in a way that suggested he knew something very amusing and that Harry was liable to feel very stupid if he knew it too.

"Then why don't you...you know your wife?"

"Because, like I said, she isn't to my tastes."

"And what is your taste?"

"Well, I suppose since you are to live in our household, there are some things you ought to know about us. Things that even Draco is not aware of."

Harry suddenly felt very paranoid. "Oh?"

"You have to understand that Narcissa is incredibly protective of Draco and his sensitive nature."

"Uh huh..." Harry acknowledged sceptically.

Draco and sensitive didn't belong in the same sentence, in his opinion.

"And," Lucius continued, studying the head of his snake cane. "That my dear wife would no doubt make sure you never walked straight again, should you reveal this secret to anyone, including him."

"All right." 

"And you were asking why Narcissa is not to my tastes," Harry nodded slowly. "Call me peculiar, but I do prefer it if the woman that I am to become involved with is actually female."

"Then why isn't Narcissa..." Malfoy's smirk widened visibly as Harry went several shades of green at once, clearly beginning to put the pieces together. "Oh my gawd... you have to be bloody joking..."

"I'm afraid not, Mister Potter," Lucius said gleefully. "My wife is, in fact, a man. I would have thought you might wonder why the potion worked on you, a male, when normally only females can get pregnant. We...added some little things and it was just bad luck that it was you who got in the way."

"Yes, but..." Harry mumbled. "But she...she looks..."

"Good enough to shag?" the older man chuckled. "Yes, but now, only you and I know otherwise. She's is the most convincing transvestite that I have ever had the good fortune to come across."

"Good fortune?" Harry asked weakly.

As if things couldn't get worse, he was on the way to the house of a transvestite he had... er... dreamed about, in a carriage with 'her' husband, who had a fetish for fondling his wand in public.

"You agree that my wife is beautiful?" Harry nodded vaguely. "So do all the pureblood families, who are - unfortunately - cursed with the faces of pugs. I had to marry to shut my mother up. Given a choice of a transvestite who every man and woman would envy or one of the local girls, who looked like they had run into the side of the manor, face-first, I chose the male."

"Y-you married a man to shut your mother up?"

"And as a favour to an old friend, with whom I have shared nearly twenty years of married life with no one being any the wiser."

"But..."

"Before you ask about sex, such a teenage obsession, had I married one of the pureblood pug-faces, I would have had less conjugal relations than I have in my mask of a marriage to Bob. Bob and I are simply involved in a partnership with no physical interaction involved, although I am certain he would happily jump on my back the first chance he got."

"B-Bob?"

"Narcissa's male name," Malfoy replied as if this were the most normal thing in the world. "You may run into Bob from time to time, especially when he's getting ready to go out. He's an outrageous flirt, more so than Narcissa and I would advise you not to turn your back on him for a moment. I learned that lesson in a rather...oblique fashion."

"O-oh..."

"And should you breath a word of this to Draco, I give you warning that be it Bob or Narcissa that comes after you, you will know the true meaning of pain," Malfoy was almost grinning gleefully at the stunned look on Harry's face. "I'm sure you'll enjoy your time in the Manor."

Cringing back against the side of the carriage, Harry tried to push aside the image of one of the village people donning the rich dresses that Narcissa was so often seen in and wondered briefly if his mind would recover from the shock.

***

"Boy."

"Nguh?"

A sharp smack on the head from Lucius Malfoy's cane quickly dispelled thoughts of drowsiness from Harry's mind and he sat up, blinking around groggily. Smacking his lips, he yawned and cricked his neck.

"Where are we?"

"Home."

The door of the carriage was opened by a house elf, who backed away rapidly as Lucius stepped down, Harry a few paces behind him. 

Night had fallen some time between the moment Harry had fallen asleep in the carriage and the moment they had drawn up into the grounds of the most incredible house he had ever seen in his life.

The Burrow had been fascinating, Hogwarts had been amazing, but this place...

It was spectacular.

Had the huge mansion been split right down the centre, each side could have served as a mirror image for the other. Warm, welcoming lights were flickering in many of the windows, the deep grey stone gleaming a silver shade in the moonlight.

So it wasn't how imagined the home of a mad dark wizard, but still...

"Lucius!"

The immense, dark wooden doors, at the top of a long flight of stairs swung open, the lights from within the house revealing a slender silhouette of - at least up until seven hours ago, what Harry had assumed was - a woman.

Harry felt a hand on his shoulder and he was yanked forcefully forward, his feet clattering on the gravel that covered the ground. He was briskly positioned in front of Malfoy, who he noticed had a very nervous smile on his face.

"Evening, Ciss..."

The tall, slender and with a corona of golden hair swirling around her face...no way that was a man!

Not a bloody chance!

Running lightly down the steps, the long robes flaring around her legs, Narcissa's face was illuminated by a smile, which faded somewhat when she looked down at Harry, who tried to surreptitiously back away.

Unfortunately, Lucius Malfoy was using him as a human shield and the dark wizard wasn't about to leave himself open to attack.

"Dear," the warm tones of Narcissa's first cry to him had frosted over a little. "Why is Harry Potter standing in front of you?"

"Um...well...erm...dar..."

"Lucius," Narcissa sing-songed.

"Wehadabitoanaccidentattheschoolandnowhe'scarryingthebabythatshouldhavebeenyoursanditreallyisn'tmyfault!"

Had he been fully awake and conscious without a snake-shaped dent in his forehead, Harry was sure he could only have identified two words in Malfoy's sentence. He didn't think it was possible for anyone to talk quite that fast without taking a breath.

"He's carrying _my_ baby? Harry Potter is carrying _my_ baby?""

Malfoy nodded. "And he knows."

Somehow, Harry found Lucius Malfoy speaking in a squeaky voice, as if he had inhaled helium, highly amusing. Even the fact that there was a very annoyed, very beautiful statuesque transvestite looming over him didn't stop the hysterical, high-pitched giggle escape him.

Narcissa's look smothered the giggle instantly. "He...knows?"

"Um..."

"Well," Narcissa caught Harry's chin in her hand and lifted his face to hers, studying him. Her voice seemed to have dropped an octave or two at the very least, when she spoke. "This is just bloody marvellous, Luce."

Harry stared at her. 

With that deep, very male voice coming from her lovely mouth, she suddenly reminded him horribly of the overweight, dungaree-wearing builder that Uncle Vernon had hired to build a conservatory.

"Can we take this inside, Ciss?"

"Luce, you bring back a boy who is the enemy of our Master, to our house, carrying the baby I was meant to have as my bloody protection and you think you can ask me to do anything?"

"Would an apology help?"

"Luce."

"That would be a no, wouldn't it?"

Narcissa smiled coldly at her...his...um...well, you know, stared at Lucius, the bloke that he/she/it was married to, the expression making Harry's already jumpy stomach twist with panic.

"So," she said, looking down at Harry, her fingers still holding his chin in a firm grip that he didn't want to try breaking free of. "You know who I am, Mister Potter? And you're carrying my baby?"

"Y-y-yes, M-Mrs Malfoy."

"Then I suppose there's only one thing I can do, considering the circumstances."

Harry whimpered with terror as she grabbed him by the shoulders and forced him to trot alongside her.

The idea of playing dead suddenly was very appealing.


	4. Girly Bonding

Chapter Four - Girly Bonding

"So this is your normal reaction, when you've been told that a complete stranger is carrying your baby?"

Lying on her stomach on the bed in the middle of the huge bedroom, Narcissa shrugged. "I wouldn't know," she replied cheerfully, feet in the air, her ankles crossed daintily. "Its never happened to me before."

Harry looked around the enormous room he had been given, wondering if he should be suspicious of some kinds of torture devices, traps or other unpleasant things hidden in the walls and floor.

This, apparently, was Narcissa's solution to the problem of having him in the house.

He had been given the largest guest room.

A huge bedroom that was easily a big as all of number four, Privet Drive, both floors included. The roof soared up into arched domes, from the centre of each was strung a glowing ball of crystal, issuing a pale, near-white light.

Many-paned windows lined all of one wall, stretching up towards the ceiling, with long, dark curtains hanging from brass rails to pool on the wooden floor. 

Another wall was occupied by a massive granite fireplace engraved with miniature gargoyles to match those on the rooftop, which was opposite the enormous bed, upon which the gorgeous Mrs Malfoy was lying.

Harry was still trying to come to terms with the fact that she was a man.

"What am I going to do here?"

"What do you mean, sweetie?"

Harry shrugged, looking around the huge room, as he sat down on the edge of the bed next to her. "I've been told I have to stay here until I have the baby, since its your baby, so what do I do? Am I confined to this room or what?"

"I would have put you in the dungeon," Lucius Malfoy volunteered from the door. A glare was flashed at him by his...could she be called a wife? Malfoy immediately fell silent, his arms crossed over his chest petulantly.

"You'll just have to ignore my husband, Harry, dear," Narcissa said, her crisp, hard tone warming as she turned back to Harry, smiling. "I sometimes forget that he's an insensitive idiot."

"Excuse me!"

"You're excused, Luce," Narcissa replied merrily, with a dismissive wave of her hand in her husband's direction. "Now, dear, tell me, how have you been finding the sensation of being pregnant?"

This conversation was wrong on so many levels, Harry mused.

For one thing, Narcissa Malfoy - the creature known as an Ice Queen and diamond-hard bitch - was actually starting to remind him of Molly Weasley in the way she was talking to him like one of her own children.

And for another, he was comparing notes on being pregnant with a man.

"I-I'm not sure yet. I'm not used to the mood swings and all that."

Narcissa laughed. "Ah, yes, mood swings," she shook her head. "How I remember them and I'm sure Luce does to." 

From his position on the bed, Harry saw Lucius Malfoy visibly shudder.

Apparently he did remember.

He had probably learned from the same error of judgement that certified that Draco Malfoy would never again annoy Harry Potter on account of him eating strange foods and taking offence when someone insulted his parents.

"Women are fickle enough as it is," Narcissa continued cheerfully. "And then you add the wonder of pregnancy-induced mood-swings and you have a walking, talking emotional time-bomb. You can get away with everything and claim you were just having a 'mood swing'."

"You mean you were pretending?" Lucius demanded indignantly.

"You were taking too long in the bath, Luce," Narcissa retorted with a pout. "You wouldn't even give me my rubber ducky so I could go and use the baths in one of the other bathrooms."

"Ciss!" the dangerous growl came from the doorway and Narcissa waved coyly over at her husband, a malicious twinkle in her eyes.

"You went and got someone else pregnant with my baby, Lucius," she called back to him. "Now, you're just going to have tolerate me when I try and cheer myself up by humiliating you." 

"As if being married to a trollop like you wasn't enough," Malfoy glared at her and Narcissa released a very girly giggle.

Harry cleared his throat and cautiously asked, "Rubber...ducky?"

Leaning closer to Harry as the seething rage rippled outwards from Malfoy, Narcissa whispered. "Lucius can't take a bath without one. Its the only thing that'll make him give up his wand for five minutes."

Harry blinked, now cursed with the image of Lucius Malfoy, the fairly infamous and usually quite terrifying Dark Wizard, sitting in a bath and playing with a bright yellow rubber duck.

"Ciss, I hate you."

"I know, darling," Narcissa replied amiably, raising a hand to muss Harry's wild hair, her other cupping her chin as she smiled sweetly across the room at Lucius. "But you'll never have enough in your bank account to make me sign divorce papers."

Harry was trying desperately not to laugh.

"So, Harry, dear," Narcissa turned her attention back to the boy. "Had any kinds of problems? Pregnancy can be an awful thing and Lucius is known for producing creatures that are more worthy of being called spawn than children."

"Ciss, that was uncalled for."

"Luce, you know I love to the little brat, so stop complaining. Harry?"

"I don't love Draco if that's what you mean."

"Why am I not surprised?" Lucius muttered.

"And I don't think he likes me very much."

"Again, an understatement, if ever I heard one."

"Lucius, would you please do the world a favour and never talk again. Ever."

Harry grinned at the scowl on Lucius' face. "But he is right, Mrs Malfoy."

"Dear, call me Narcissa. Or Ciss." A snort from the door suggested that Malfoy thought them both mad. "And call the grumpy old git in the corner 'grumpy old git' with my permission."

"Narcissa!"

A perfectly manicured finger was pointed in Lucius' direction. "Don't you even think about trying to stop me doing anything, or I'll have Snape make up some more of that potion with HIS genes in it and get you pregnant!"

A Snape-Malfoy hybrid.

Harry went rather green at the thought.

Malfoy apparently received the same mental image and his face rapidly shifted colour to match his robes.

Narcissa seemed quite satisfied and turned back to Harry. "So you were saying something about my little boy?"

"Well, the last time I saw him I dumped a bowl of yoghurt on his head..."

There was a choking sound from the door, which may have been smothered laughter from the boy's father.

"A mood swing?"

"And he insulted my parents," Harry admitted. "And almost called me..." He was shocked when his mouth refused to say the word 'fat'. It seemed to think that the three letter word was something of ultimate evil. "Well, it wasn't a good thing to say about my size..."

Which, he mused, his body seemed to agree with.

"Well, you are looking a little...round."

Harry blinked at Lucius Malfoy. "Round?" he echoed.

"Erm...why don't you tell Ciss about your bladder trouble?"

Harry felt like he was swelling up as the anger flooded him. Oh good! An example of a classic mood swing! After all, he had been confined to a moving box all day and had kept his temper fairly well.

Now...now, he was going to enjoy this!

"Why don't you explain what you meant when you said 'round'?"

"He had to go to the toilet twenty times!" Malfoy hastily interceded, clearly tying to smother Harry's anger.

"You stopped twenty times and still managed to get here in the usual time?"

"No," Harry scowled. Inside him, it felt like someone had turned a jacuzzi on full power and bubbles of anger were whooshing through him. Yes, it would have to be a rage-jacuzzi, but the analogy worked! "He didn't pull over once!"

Narcissa clapped a hand over her mouth, muffling a gasp of "Oh Merlin!" 

"What?"

"You...he made you whizz out the window?"

"Um..."

When Malfoy had said that it was the only way he was going to be able to relieve himself on the journey, Harry had immediately been struck by the headlines that would no doubt hit the Daily Prophet pages the next morning: "Muggles struck by fountains of urine in thin air - missing Hogwarts pupil chief suspect".

Unfortunately, nature had called.

Several times.

Lucius had gleefully kept tabs on the number of people he had hit.

"Lucius!"

"I-I...was that wrong?" Harry inquired sheepishly.

Was peeing out of the window of a moving carriage onto unsuspecting muggle passers-by wrong?

Hmm.

Clearly the Malfoy code of (im)proper conduct was starting to brush off on the hero of the wizarding world.

"The carriage was invisible, correct?" Harry nodded, a little bemused by where this way going. "You didn't know that when you stick something outside of the carriage, it immediately becomes visible!"

Harry blinked.

The Headlines of the Daily Prophet suddenly got even worse: "Disembodied willy seen flying through Oxford countryside".

He whimpered, suddenly hoping that there was no photographic evidence of this strange phenomenon, especially since it had really been rather chilly outside and he didn't want any potential girlfriends put off by that fact!

"That wasn't very nice of him..."

"No," Narcissa agreed. "Just like him saying you were round."

Malfoy's eyes flicked from one to the other and Harry suddenly understood the expression 'like a rabbit in the headlights'. Lucius looked ready to bolt out of the room, but Malfoy dignity prevailed and he settled for edging as rapidly as he could towards the door, without looking like he was fleeing.

"I merely say things as I see them."

"And what do you mean by that?" Whoohoo! Anger rising! Hands in fists. Breathing through clenched teeth. Eyes so wide he knew the whites must be showing (and drying out through lack of blinking, but if it looked scary, what did vision matter?!).

All in all, Harry knew he was probably posing a pretty terrifying sight, considering he was meant to be an all round (but not in a fat way! Really!) nice guy, who would never hurt a fly.

"I said that you are looking rather rotund."

Harry looked blank.

Nacrissa leaned closer. "It means fat," she said in a stage-whisper.

"So!" Harry pointed an accusing finger at Malfoy, who was glancing at the door, as if wondering if he would be able to leg-it without being noticed or caught out. "So you're saying I-I'm...fat."

Oh crap!

He could feel his eyes start to prickle the moment the last word of the sentence changed from a nice, normal word to an utterly pitiful little whine.

"I don't have to answer to you!" The sharp biting tone of the older man's voice was the final straw and Harry felt the anger surging, but it was rapidly overtaken by another feeling.

Sinuses...burning.

Eyes...brimming.

Nose...prickling.

He wanted to hurl himself out the nearest window when he burst into floods of tears.

"That wasn't nice!" he howled miserably.

Oh marvellous.

Not even just tears, but the full force, tidal wave tears.

Where was the bloody on-off switch? 

Why didn't he have a bloody tap to stop himself from bursting into tears and looking like a complete prat?

The anger was fading, overwritten by misery and despair at the fact he was looking so bloody stupid and he really didn't want that, grabbing at the last strands of rage, before the sheer patheticness got too much.

Not that it wasn't bad enough already.

Snot and tears were streaming down his face and Narcissa looked ready to charge her husband and beat him to a pulp.

Lucius, though, did the worst thing he could.

For a man bent on preserving his own skin, he really didn't seem to be doing a very good job of it.

He smirked.

At Harry.

Which was apparently the anger on-off-mechanism.

And the rage returned full force.

"How dare you make me upset!" Harry wailed, but with the force of hysterical anger starting to override the tears. "You make me ride in a box and you don't let me pee when I need to and mocked me and picked on me all the way here and never once apologised for putting me in this state, not one and now, you just keep on making me look like an idiot by crying!"

"And made you dangle your tackle out the carriage window for all to see," Narcissa supplied helpfully with a nasty grin in her husband's direction.

"And that!" Harry yelled vehemently, wagging a finger angrily in Lucius' direction, tears still pouring down his face by the bucketload.

All right, maybe the tears weren't so bad, once you got used to them and they did make the angry voice sound so much more impressive.

Narcissa was on her feet, standing beside Harry. "You tell him, dear!"

"You're mean! You're rude! You're derisive, whatever that means and I'm not sure, but I heard it and it sounds insulting so you're it! You're condescending! You're an arrogant pig! You're insulting! You're such a...so...such..."

Harry trailed off uselessly, unable to find something vehement enough to emphasise his argument and Narcissa patted him comfortingly on the shoulder as he panted, still glaring at Lucius Malfoy, who was looking rather...stunned, like someone who had just stood through a tidal wave. 

"Is he always so...?"

"Always," Narcissa confirmed with a sigh. She gave Harry an understanding smile and squeezed his shoulder. "Don't worry. He's just very insensitive about these things because he's a man."

There was a silence.

Narcissa looked at Harry.

Harry looked at the woman commonly known as Bob.

"Ah..." Narcissa cleared her throat.

"Well..."Harry agreed, looking at his feet.

"And therein," Lucius added with a snicker. "Lies the stupidity of that argument."

Of course, he bolted as soon as the words left his mouth.

Unfortunately, he didn't run nearly fast enough.


	5. The Father

Chapter Five - The Father

Nearly three weeks had passed since Harry's arrival at Malfoy Manor.

It was almost exactly that time since Lucius Malfoy had spoken to either Harry or his transvestite wife, Narcissa, so when he actually walked into the room where the odd pair were eating breakfast, they were mildly surprised.

His hair was, fortunately, back to its normal colour.

Had it still been neon green with purple and orange polkadots, Harry was sure he would have cracked up laughing. Lucius' skin, though, was still visibly striped pink and blue from the colourful set of hexes that had been thrown at him.

Of course, he had only been hexed after a wild chase through the halls of the manor, which culminated in Narcissa performing the most spectacular slide-tackle that Harry had ever seen just outside the drawing room.

"Good morning, dear," Narcissa said cheerfully, as Lucius stomped towards the opposite end of the ten foot table. He made a rude gesture with his cane. "Nice of you to finally stop sulking."

"I was not sulking, Ciss."

Narcissa gave him a knowing look that almost set Harry giggling. 

Of course, he didn't giggle aloud, or in public, because that would place him firmly in girly territory, which was something he really didn't like the idea of. It was bad enough that his stomach was now a bump and he was almost a quarter of the way into a magical pregnancy.

Fortunately, the morning sickness had waned and he was less and less inclined to burst into tears at the slightest thing, although that could be attributed to the fact that Narcissa was an absolute angel and that Lucius had not come anywhere near them since the first night in the manor.

"You should know better, Luce," Narcissa was saying as Harry spread thick layers of kipper paste onto his bacon and egg buttie, adding a large dollop of peanut butter for the crunchy texture he liked. "You never insult a pregnant...er...person's femininity, even if they are proud to be male."

"Hmpf."

"Actually," Narcissa continued amiably, as her husband glared darkly at his piece of toast. "You should know to never insult a pregnant person in any way, shape or form. Even Voldemort knows that its madness."

"So it's true, then?" Harry inquired curiously around a large mouthful of bacon, egg, kipper and peanut butter roll. "Voldemort is afraid of pregnant women?"

"I suppose you...could say that," Lucius Malfoy said. He looked like he was trying to smother a smirk.

"Could?" Narcissa was laughing out loud. "Dear Merlin, the man is terrified of pregnant women! If he sees one in the street these days, he usually turns and walks very quickly in the opposite direction!"

"Why?"

A burst of laughter from Lucius made him stare.

Lucius Malfoy could actually laugh and sound vaguely normal?

All right.

Harry was officially scared!

"It...it was a rather...funny story," Lucius managed to say, between chuckles, while Narcissa was giggling behind a hand. "Voldemort decided he wanted to...take out a group of muggles...just to show how truly evil he was..."

"And the blithering idiot went and picked a group who had just left their antenatal class!" Narcissa squealed with laughter, clapping her hands together. "Twenty-five very pregnant muggle women!"

"Twenty...five?" Despite the fact that he hated the Dark Lord with a passion, Harry couldn't help feeling a little sorry for him.

Well, not for him, but for the humiliation that no doubt ensued.

"He thought he would scare them...taunting them..." Lucius continued, a broad smile on his face. It looked very odd to see him that way, but it was...nice to see he could do something as normal as smiling. "Some of them started crying, which definitely wasn't a good thing..."

"When one cries, they all cry," Narcissa agreed. "It was a...pregnancy thing, I think."

"But Voldemort had never dealt with a pregnant woman before..."

"So he taunted them more and if you taunt someone just enough, you cross the line and hit the anger reflex."

"And, by Merlin, he did it in style!" Lucius was slapping his hand on the table with the force of his amusement. "The leader stormed at him and started bitch-slapping him upside the head!"

Harry choked on the piece of toast he was chewing.

Narcissa grinned at him. "It gets worse," she said. "The others agreed with her and charged in. Voldemort was squealing like a girl! He didn't get to his wand fast enough and the Death Eaters were just standing there, staring! They didn't have a clue what to do!"

"No, dear," Lucius corrected, wiping a tear of laughter from his eye. "The Dark Lord was shrieking like a baby and we were pissing ourselves laughing at the look on his face. It made it rather difficult to be intimidating."

"What happened?" Harry asked.

The fit of hysterics that ensued at both ends of the table left Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy incoherent for almost five minutes, but for feeble gasps as they struggled to catch their breath between giggles.

"He...ran..." Lucius wheezed.

"Hiked up his robes..."

"Flashed his chicken legs..."

"And ran away down the street, screaming!"

They both howled with laughter.

"Oh! Oh!" Narcissa waved her hands. "You forgot! The underwear!"

Lucius burst out laughing again, tears of mirth rolling down his cheeks. "Oh Merlin! I had forgotten about that!"

"Underwear?"

"Voldemort...he...he..."

Giggling hysterically, Narcissa tried to succeed where her husband had been reduced to a chuckling wreck. "He wears...wears...oh Merlin! I had forgotten!" 

"Wears what?" Harry asked, perplexed.

Shaking with laughter, Lucius Malfoy finally calmed himself enough to say. "The Dark Lord wears a pink, lacy thong."

Harry blinked.

Voldemort being attacked by a horde of pregnant muggles, who bitch-slapped him upside the head. Voldemort hiking up his robes and fleeing in terror. Voldemort wearing a pink, lacy thong...

His eyes went round.

"Oh...my...God..."

The laughter rapidly ensued.

Narcissa looked along the table at Lucius, who was smiling appreciatively. "I told you he would fit in with our mad little world, didn't I, Luce?" she remarked, with a fond look at Harry.

Lucius gave Harry a brief, curious and pensive look, but made no reply, although the smile on his face remained.

***

Standing at the top of the main staircase of Malfoy Manor, one hand resting on the swell of his stomach, the other on the broad granite banister, Harry frowned slightly at the figure in the hallway.

He had never seen the stranger before, although he couldn't help feeling there was something familiar about him.

Tall and very slim and streamlined for a man, he was gracefully pulling on a set of evening outer-robes. Long, silky silver-blond hair, not unlike Lucius and Narcissa's, was pulled back at the nape of his neck, held there by a dark ribbon.

"Ex-cuse me?" he called, as he started down the staircase.

The man turned and looked up at him, smiling with lips that Harry knew should definitely be a lot more red.

"Harry! Sweetie!" The man gave an elegant little twirl. "Will I do?"

Green eyes went round. "N-Narcissa?"

"Well, when I look like this, I do prefer to be called Bob, Harry," Narcissa, or Bob as we must now call her, replied, grinning. Gesturing down at his elegant robes, he spread his hands. "Well? Will I do?"

"Do for what?"

Bob's grin was purely filthy. "For a night on the tiles, of course, silly!" he replied cheerfully. "I'm off to the Wonky Wand to try and find me a wizard who will give me a good solid shag. Maybe that Weasley, who sometimes shows up..."

"Weasley?"

"Mmm," Bob agreed. "Tall, long red hair, wears leather a lot...very nice arse..."

"Bill?"

Harry tried to keep his face straight at the thought of Ron's reaction if anything did come of Bob and Bill. 

Yes, Ron, your brother is gay. Yes, your brother has a boyfriend called Bob. Yes, the boyfriend is a transvestite. Oh, and did you know that the boyfriend is also the mother of our arch-nemesis? Funny old world, isn't it? 

"So that's his name, eh? Gives me an advantage already, that does!" Picking up an oddly-shaped furry hat, Bob turned to the mirror on the wall and started to position the hat on top of his perfectly-groomed hair. "I'll be out all night, if things go well... and even if they don't, I won't be back before dawn."

"You...you're leaving me on my own?"

"Oh, you won't be on your own, sweets," Bob replied with a smile. "Lucius is in the living room. Ask him nicely and I'm sure he'll keep you company."

"But he...he doesn't like me."

"Looking at our 'close' relationship, Harry, anyone would say he doesn't really like me either," Bob remarked. "But I've spent nearly twenty years with the silly twit. I can't imagine life without him, even if he does have divorce papers lying around and has done since our wedding day."

"Wouldn't any boyfriend you got be...a little put out to find out you're married?"

Bob sighed, bringing a hand to his brow dramatically. "Ah, yes," he exclaimed melodramatically, then grinned. "But I do have a...way with words," Feigning a lisp, he fanned himself and breathed. "Oh darling, for you I would divorce my darling husband, even if does mean losing my wing of our mansion, where we could easily set up home and we would lose the pool house and all those wonderfully muscley servant boys, who are just SO pretty!"

Harry was doubled over giggling by the time Bob stopped.

"As you can see," Bob finished cheerfully. "I have plenty of reasons, mainly in the bank, why it would be safer and better to stay married to one of the richest wizards in the wizarding world and most boy-toys wouldn't be able to resist the thought of all the pretty servant boys. Plus, I would never dream of divorcing Lucius. Ever. Any boyfriend that was deemed good enough would have to be able to deal with the fact that Lucius will always be my husband and nothing will change it."

"Why?"

Bob gave him an odd look. "Because I love the silly coot."

"L-love?"

"Sweetie, if he had turned his back on me for long enough, I would have loved him every which way I could and then some..." Bob's grin was broad and filthy, but it faded to a genuine smile. "He might not be my way inclined, but he has been very good to me. He's one of the best in the world, although not many people realise it. I think I'm the only one who has so far..."

"Lucius? Best in the world?"

"You're rapidly coming up in my poll, sweets," Bob reached up and mussed Harry's hair. "You remind me of a younger, straight, scrawnier and...well, not to be rude, but less-fashion-inclined version of me. Luce, on the other hand, he's just my great big teddy bear. You just have to understand him."

"I think I'd rather not."

Bob studied him for a long moment. "You never know, sweetie," he said. "Talk to him. I mean, you are carrying his baby, so it might help if you knew something about the father."

"I suppose..." Harry admitted.

"And now," Bob grabbed a long cane from the rack that stood beneath the mirror. It was topped with a silver rose. "I had best be off for a night of fun, frolicks and fu..."

"I get the idea!"

Bob laughed, then twirled around to show off his ensemble to it's best. "So, sweets, you like?" Harry nodded approvingly. "And what about the hat?"

"It looks...er..."

"Fuzzy?"

"I was thinking gay."

"Perfect!" Bob laughed and dropped a kiss on Harry's forehead. "Don't wait up, sweetie! I plan to make a night of it!"

That said, he flounced out of the door, leaving Harry standing in the hall, shaking his head and chuckling. Turning left, he entered the living room and could see Lucius Malfoy sitting on the couch, apparently watching the flames of the fire in the grate. 

The house was oddly silent without Narcissa's merry prattling and Harry quietly approached the couch, wondering if he should take Bob's advice and try to work out the man who had left him pregnant.

Coming level with the couch, the expression on Lucius' face was one he had never seen before.

The older man was comfortably sprawled on the couch, his eyes fixed on the flames, but he looked...sad. Strangely sad and pensive. One of his hands was tracing absent circles on the arm of the couch and every so often, he exhaled a quiet sigh.

Carefully sitting, Harry saw the moment that Lucius' expression closed. It was the moment the couch shifted and told him he was no longer alone, his features growing tight as his eyes turned to Harry.

"Boy," he acknowledged.

"Do...do you mind if I sit here?"

Lucius started to push himself onto his feet. "Feel free," he replied, but Harry's hand on his arm stopped him from rising. Cool grey eyes looked down at the hand, then at Harry's face, a flurry of emotions crossing his features. "What is it, boy?"

"Please, I...that is...I would rather not be left alone."

Lucius snorted, starting to pull away. "I'll send a house elf."

"No! Please!" Harry grasped at his wrist desperately, looking around the massive room. The plea was entirely genuine, the room large and gloomy and altogether rather frightening to be left alone in. "Narcissa has gone out and this place...I-I don't like being on my own...I never have...its like being..." he trailed off. "Never mind."

"It's like what, boy?" Lucius made no attempt to move away, but nor did he sit back on the couch.

Harry shivered at the thought of his home life with the Dursleys. The cupboard under the stairs. The darkness. The isolation. The insults. The loneliness. "It would be just like it was before I went to Hogwarts."

"How so, boy?" 

"I don't like being on my own," he replied, so softly that he could barely even hear his own voice. "Like I was with the Dursleys."

"As if the famous Harry Potter would ever be on his own!" Lucius scoffed.

"That's what everyone thinks," Harry murmured, lost in thought. "Everyone assumes that, but they didn't let me have friends. They made sure I was always alone...that I was treated like nothing. I wasn't worth anything to them."

There was a rustle of the velvety fabric of the couch, as Lucius slid back and Harry reluctantly raised his eyes to find Lucius gazing at him, an intrigued expression on his pale face. "They didn't honour you for what you had done?"

"Honour me?" Harry almost laughed at the concept. "They hated me for what my parents were. They were afraid of what I might become, so they tried to crush it out of me by treating me like little more than a slave, an animal."

Lucius' eyes had narrowed slightly. "That can't be true. Dumbledore would never allow such a thing," he seemed to be saying it more to convince himself. "He would have done his utmost to protect you."

"He was the one that left me on their doorstep," Harry replied quietly. "He has never once faced them, not once. He couldn't face them. Instead, he left me on their step, wrapped in a blanket and holding a letter."

"And people wonder why I despise the old man," Lucius muttered, shaking his head in disbelief.

"He probably had a reason for it," Harry said, looking down at his hands. Despite the fact that nothing cruel or derisive had been said by Lucius, his eyes were stinging at the memories of his life before he had learned about his heritage. 

"Probably some nonsense about building character or strengthening will or rubbish like that," Lucius spat in vehement distaste, then seemed to notice Harry's dejected posture. "Boy... Harry..."

"I tried to believe that," he whispered tearfully. "Everyone expected me to be so strong, so powerful, so smart and popular...I had defeated Voldemort, so surely I was meant to be all those things...but I'm not...I'm just a kid..."

His throat was burning with the effort of trying to contain his tears and he pressed his eyes shut, pressing the heels of his hands against his forehead.

It came as no small shock when two hands were gently laid on his shoulders and he was drawn against Lucius Malfoy's chest, the older man letting him burrow into his embrace as the tears came.

Despite his mental voice howling that he was acting like a big girl's blouse, Harry let himself cry for the first time in years, safe in the knowledge that he wouldn't get slapped down by his guardians or mocked or derided.

He had only felt this safe and protected once before and that was when Molly Weasley embraced him like a mother would. 

Now, he wondered as Lucius Malfoy embraced him tightly, protectively, was this what being held by his father would have felt like? Would he have felt so safe and sheltered from the world?

"You're not going back there, boy," Harry heard Lucius murmur. "You're going to have some semblance of a real life now. Dumbledore can say what he likes, but you are under my protection now."

Had he been able to speak the words, Harry knew he would never even have been able to find the right ones to say just how grateful he was.

Instead, he remained there, curled up in Lucius Malfoy's protective arms, until he was cried out, and gradually fell into a deep and exhausted sleep, Lucius' arms still around his shoulders.


	6. Glowing

Chapter Six - Glowing 

"I'll see that...and raise you a Galleon..."

"A Galleon?" Lucius arched an eyebrow. "My, you really are the big spender, aren't you, boy?"

Harry grinned. "This coming from the bloke who only raises knuts?" Bob burst out laughing and Harry went a peculiar shade of crimson. "I didn't mean it like that!" he exclaimed hastily.

"Of course you didn't," Lucius chuckled, shaking his head. "But then, we both well know that Bob is a filthy minded son of a bitch."

"That I am!" Bob admitted cheerfully, grinning. "And proud of it, thank you very much, Mister Malfoy."

"Why do I tolerate you, Mrs Malfoy?"

Bob batted his eyelashes. "So we actually have some glamour in this marriage?"

Harry Potter couldn't help laughing.

Had anyone told him, only four months before, that by mid-November, he would be two and a half months pregnant with Lucius Malfoy's child and would be actually enjoying the company of Lucius and his transvestite wife, he would have told them they were mad.

Mind you, he would have told them they were barking if they even tried to suggest that Narcissa was anything but a stunning woman.

Now, the three of them were in the Malfoy's specifically designed social room in the West wing of the Manor, which was built on much the same design as a muggle casino, complete with leather-covered stools positioned around the round table they were currently seated at and a green-shaded lamp hanging down over them, giving them just enough light.

A pile of galleons, sickles and knuts was heaped in the middle of the table, glinting dully in the light, as Bob shifted his cards, looking from Harry to Lucius, a smirk on his lips.

Lucius had provided all the coins, having... 'lost' all the plastic poker chips. 

Bob had sheepishly muttered something about being bored and pinging them at the top of Voldemort's head during the last Death Eaters meeting and the Dark Lord had gotten so frustrated that he had hexed them to dust. 

The only reason that Bob hadn't been hexed was because he had fearlessly flung himself - as Narcissa - into Voldemort's arms and squealed about skilful he was with the 'hex' and 'she' wondered if the wonderfully skilled Dark Lord, who "really knows how to work with his wand just the way I liked it", would like to spend some time practising 'hex' with her.

Clearly Voldemort's hearing needed checking, as he had apparently gotten very flustered, very quickly.

That was something else that Harry had learned in the course of his stay with the Malfoys: Lord Voldemort was possibly the Darkest Wizard in the world because he had never had a shag and it had built up into a seething pit of unresolved sexual tension that now, he couldn't resolve because...

Harry had nearly wet himself laughing when he had been told.

With the emergence of his snake-features, the rest of his body had followed suite, taking on some more snakey features, which meant that his once-grand and very well-sized eight-incher shrank. A lot.

Of course, the Death Eaters feigned ignorance, but every one of them knew that their Dark Lord padded his dainty little thong with a rolled up gym sock.

Lucius certainly had a gift with providing Harry with scary visuals.

Picking up several coins from the stack that had replaced the poker chips, Bob put them on the large pile in the middle of the table. "I'll see you and raise you enough for a new suit."

"He's bluffing," Harry remarked to Lucius.

"Clearly," Lucius returned.

"Will you two stop doing that?" Bob exclaimed, slapping his cards down on the top of the table. "You're being all...male-bondy over this stupid game and it isn't fair on me! I wasn't bluffing! I have very good cards!" One pair of green and a pair of grey eyes looked at him sceptically. "Okay, maybe I was bluffing...a little..."

"Bob," Harry said patiently, trying not to grin at the very Narcissa-esque pout on Bob's face. "We know you can't play poker, so you can only be bluffing since you have no idea what you're doing."

"I can so play!"

"Bob..."

"Okay, okay!" He threw his hands up. "I can't play! So what if I have," He flipped his cards over. "A Queen of hearts, a Jack of hearts, a ten of hearts, a King of hearts and a one of hearts?"

Harry and Lucius both quickly checked their own cards.

"Yes, you're right, Bob, very bad hand you have there," Lucius said quickly, closing his hand to conceal a run of two of diamonds to five of diamonds.

"Awful," Harry agreed, hiding his two nines.

"This is a stupid game anyway," Bob groused petulantly, pushing the pile of money away from himself. "I want to play something fun! Something silly! Something that I know how to play!"

"Bob, you know very that Harry is in no condition to play Twister with you!" Lucius said firmly, gesturing to Harry's very large and very round belly which was hidden underneath a baggy shirt, acquired from Lucius' own wardrobe. "He only has a month left and we can't risk anything happening early."

Bob screwed up his nose. "You're no fun, Luce..." he replied huffily, then studied the other man speculatively. "I could always play you..."

"And again, I have to answer with an emphatic no."

Looking from one to the other, Bob's brows beetled, as he tried to think of another reason for Harry to play. Or, alternatively, tried to think up a new game that a very pregnant seventeen year old could play.

"I know!"

"Dear God, have mercy," Lucius moaned, burying his head in his arms on the table.

"Oh, shut up, you cranky old wanker," Bob said airily, getting to his boot-clad feet and adjusting his dark blue shirt. "Harry, sweetie, come with me."

"Where to?" he asked, having learned the hard way that 'Come with me' could lead to anywhere. 

He had been directed through a door only a week earlier, when he had been looking for one of the many toilets in the Manor, and immediately was tossed straight into what could be potentially one of the most embarrassing moments of his life. 

Narcissa had said 'come with me' and foolishly - out of desperation for a toilet - he had followed her. 

Yes, she had actually lead him to a toilet, which he almost kissed with relief before using, only to turn around and find that she had led him straight into Lucius' private bathroom, where a very embarrassed Lucius was trying to pretend he wasn't playing with battleships in the tub.

After blinking several times and trying not to notice that Lucius had strategically placed a large toy submarine over a certain...area, he had realised that he should probably leave the room with a hasty, "Um...I'll be going...er...nice bathroom..." 

Needless to say, he had learned to be very suspicious very quickly, especially after waddling as fast as he could out of the bathroom, his face as red as Lucius' was, to find Narcissa howling with laughter in the hall.

"My room, sweetie!"

Lucius was on his feet instantly. "Bob, you are not going to corrupt the poor boy!" he said, his voice hard as ice. Bob pouted. "And don't pull that ridiculous face at me! I forbid you to take the boy to your room!"

"Why?" Harry inquired carefully.

Of late, Lucius seemed to be prone to more mood swings than he did, without even having pregnancy as an excuse.

He insisted on doing and saying everything and anything to make sure that Harry was at ease at all times. They had come completely full circle on the relationship they had had, when Harry first arrived.

"Trust me, boy, you don't want to know."

"It wasn't going to be for sex! Well...not yet." Bob crossed his arms. "You know I wouldn't do anything to hurt him, Luce," he said defiantly. "I just want to do a little bit of...you know...father-mother-transgendered-being bonding."

"Should those words scare me as much as they do?" Harry asked out of the corner of his mouth. 

"More than likely," Lucius replied in an equally low voice, his silver-grey eyes glinting. "But," he added, giving Harry a none-too-gentle push towards the grinning Bob. "I see no harm in letting my wife play with her favourite toy."

"Lucius!"

"Goodie!"

Before Harry could even let any mood-swing-style anger affect him enough to screech abuse at the father of his child, a pair of manicured hands had grabbed him by the arm and he was being dragged off into the hidden depths of Malfoy Manor, by the skipping Bob, to a place all mortal men fear to tread.

Narcissa Malfoy's bedroom.

Also known as "The Makeover room".

His wail carried through the halls as they vanished from Lucius sight.

"Luuuuuuuuuuuuccccccccccciiiiiiiiiiiiiiuuuuuuuuuusssssss!"

***

"I hate you."

"Likewise, sweetie," Bob laughed. "And you look adorable."

Harry glowered, unsuccessfully trying to squirm free of the red and gold monstrosity he had been flung into by Bob's expert hands before he could voice a protest or even open his mouth to scream for help. 

"Wait a minute..." he tried to back up as Bob approached, a box-shaped object in his hands. "Put that down, Bob! Put it down!"

"Smile, sweetie!"

"NO!"

The camera bulb flashed and Harry wanted to cry.

Here he was, heavily pregnant, and stuffed - like a turkey at Christmas - into a large gold and scarlet cocktail dress, with slits that went almost to the top of his thighs and showed an indecent amount of fairly hairy leg, and stilettos.

And now, there was photographic evidence.

"Those really are your colours, Harry. I should have know...such a good Gryffindor, aren't you?" Bob cooed, laughing as he placed the camera back on the dresser and moved to help Harry stand upright.

The dresser took up a large section of the wall of the walk-in wardrobe in Bob/ Narcissa's bedroom, the rest of the walls hung with clothes for all occasions, in every shape, colour and fashion Harry had ever imagined.

"Some good Gryffindor," Harry mumbled sheepishly, as he pushed the straps of the dress off his shoulders and tried to wriggle out of it. "Pregnant by one of the most famous Slytherin couples of recent times."

"And you look absolutely fantastic as well," Bob said cheerfully, pulling the delicate straps of the sequinned dress back up despite Harry's futile struggle to remove it. "I don't know what it is about pregnancy, but it gives people a glow..."

"The silly twit is right," another voice spoke from the door of the wardrobe. Lucius was leaning against the frame, watching them and chuckling. "Even in that bloody ridiculous dress. Honestly, Bob, it looked a fright on your mother. What made you think it would look any better on Harry?"

Bob sniffed. "I think he looks very good."

"I might look good to you, but I..." Green eyes widened. "Ow..."

"Ow?" Bob echoed nervously, grabbing Harry's arm and helping him to sit down on the seat in front of the mirror. "What do you mean 'Ow'?" He turned to Lucius urgently. "What does he mean 'Ow'?"

Lucius was kneeling by Harry's side in a heartbeat. "What is it?"

A look of awe-struck wonder crossed Harry's face, one hand coming to his rounded belly reverently. "It...it kicked," he replied, raising his face to them, his voice shaking with emotion. "I-I felt it kicking."

"You did?"

Grabbing one of Lucius' hands, Harry placed it on his belly. "There..." he said.

"I don't feel..." Grey eyes rounded. "Oh..."

"Let me feel! Let me feel!"

"No groping, Bob!" Lucius cautioned, as Bob shoved his hand aside.

Bob rolled his eyes. "This is hardly the time, is it, Luce?"

"This is you we're talking about, Bob," Harry reminded him with a grin.

The blond-haired man tried to act shocked, but failed miserably. "I'll try and keep my hands in respecta...omigawd!" he squeaked, looking from Harry to Harry's belly and back again. "It kicked! I felt it!"

"It..." For the first time, it actually struck Harry. The reality of the situation. This situation. He was really pregnant. There was really a baby growing inside of him, a little life, protected by his own body.

He tried to push thoughts of the stomach-bursting scene from Aliens to the back of his mind. It had to be now that the one film that the Dursleys had let him watch came back to haunt him with a vengeance.

"Harry?" Lucius was studying him with concern. "Are you all right?"

For some reason, he couldn't say exactly why, his eyes were filling with tears. "I'm pregnant," he whispered, staring at Lucius. "I'm really pregnant...with a baby...with... with your baby..."

The older man nodded once, then smiled. Even after all the weeks he had had to get used to that rare, warm smile, it still stunned Harry how...kind Malfoy could look. "It is a rather...odd concept, isn't it?" he said, his tone reassuring as he gently squeezed Harry's knee.

"Just a little."

Lucius' eyes narrowed slightly, studying Harry closely. "Are you all right? You look a little...pale."

"It...its just hit me for the first time..." Harry replied unsteadily, feeling like he was both burning up from the inside and freezing to the core. "I'm pregnant. I'm actually pregnant. With a baby...what...what are we going to do?"

"What do you mean?"

Even Bob had fallen strangely silent.

"I-I mean, I'm carrying your baby...what happens when it comes out?" His voice was shrill with fear and confusion. "Do we all just go back to normal and pretend nothing happened? Do you keep it? The baby? Do I pretend it doesn't exist? Do I pretend that I haven't been here? That I haven't been living with you?" He looked from one face to the other, tears rolling down his face as he forced the words out, his throat choked up. "Do I pretend...do I pretend that I haven't felt more safe...more safe and more loved here than I ever felt anywhere in my life?"

"Oh, Harry," Kneeling up, Lucius gathered the sobbing teenager against his chest, his own face contorted in pain and sympathy. "You needn't leave if you don't want to, you know. I told you that you were under my protection and I was serious."

"But I can't stay here..." Harry's voice was broken. "I can't risk anything happening to you...not with Voldemort still around...you'll be in danger...and the baby..." Wild green eyes rose. "What if he tries to take the baby?"

Bob's hands squeezed one of Harry's reassuringly. "We won't ever let that happen, sweetie," he promised, his grey eyes steely with resolve. "You and this little squirt are parts of our family now and nothing, not even old Snakeeyes can take you away."

Scrubbing his eyes with his free hand, tucked oddly-comfortably between Lucius and Bob, Harry forced a watery smile at each of them. "This might take some explaining, for you," he mumbled.

"Why do you say that?" Lucius asked.

"How are you going to tell Draco that I'm going to be his quazi-step-mother?" 


	7. Emotional High

Chapter Seven - Emotional High

"He's on his way home!"

Sitting at the table in the drawing room next door to the main living room of the Manor, poring over his class work, Harry looked up at Narcissa. "Who?" he asked, noticing absently that Lucius hadn't looked up and seemed to be sitting quite rigidly on the other side of the table.

"Draco!" Narcissa clapped her hands together. "My little boy!"

"Oh..." A strange numbness settled over Harry at the thought of his most hated rival from school. Even though he now knew the parents, he couldn't help cringing at the thought of the blond Slytherin and his derisive, mocking attitude. "That's...nice."

Narcissa didn't seem to notice the lack of enthusiasm, making up for it with her own. "My little dragon!" she laughed. "I'll have to help him get settled in again... Lucius, you'll have to come and meet him as well!"

The weary "Yes, Ciss." made Harry look over the table with concern.

Lucius was slouched in his seat, one hand spread on the surface of the table, his eyes focussed distractedly on a dark knot of wood beneath his fingertips. He had never looked so...down.

As Narcissa danced off merrily to prepare for her son's arrival, Harry rose and rounded the table, hesitantly touching Lucius' shoulder. "Lucius?"

The older wizard visibly started in surprise, looking up. "Harry?"

"Are you...all right? You don't look very happy?"

"I don't look happy?" He gave a rough, almost bark of laughter, which didn't come close to reaching his eyes. "Of course, I'm happy. My son is home, isn't he? My boy. The most selfish, arrogant little bastard you are likely to meet. Of course I'm thrilled about it."

Harry was momentarily confused. "What?"

"Excuse me," Lucius said quietly, getting to his feet and pushing passed the very pregnant youth. "I ought to go and greet him."

Unable to find any words to stop him, Harry watched the wizard cross the room and enter the long hallway, where Narcissa was calling him. He heard the front door creak open and Narcissa's happy shout.

"DRACO!"

A stinging prick of pain struck him beneath his heart. 

This was one of those times that he wished he could remember what it was like to be loved by his mother. One hand rose and he touched the scar on his brow, the sign of her love for him through the curse of another.

His other hand strayed to his stomach, where there was a tiny little person growing day by day, a little person who was part of him, a little person he was starting to love, even though he didn't know what it was.

Would he love the baby as much as Narcissa loved Draco?

And what of Lucius?

He...he actually looked like he truly despised his own son, so what of this little one growing in him? Would Lucius hate it as well?

Biting on his lower lip, Harry edged towards the door, keeping out of sight. 

Through the opening, he saw Draco and Narcissa entering the hall, Narcissa's arms around the blond youth. He was smiling up at her, talking rapidly about something he had done at school.

Something involving a 'mudblood'.

Same old Draco, Harry mused as he closed his eyes with a sigh.

In the Hall, he heard Lucius say his son's name.

Peering out again, he saw Draco smirk. "Father," he said in that lazy drawl which made most people want to smack him in the mouth.

"I trust you have behaved appropriately during your term."

"As always, father," Draco replied lazily. He still sounded like a stuck-up little snot and Harry wanted to tip another bowl of yoghurt over his head for being so blatantly rude. "Mother, come on! We have to unpack!"

Narcissa apparently agreed with him and 'mother' and son departed into the winding hallways of Malfoy Manor, leaving the father standing in the hall, as rigid as a statue, his jaw clenched.

Lucius Malfoy's hands were balled in fists by his sides and he remained motionless for several minutes, drawing a few long, slow breaths. 

Then, stiffly, he walked through towards the large living room, which was the largest room in the Manor and was the place that Harry and Lucius had first spoken like civilised beings, the night that Bob had gone out.

Something wasn't right.

Edging out of the drawing room as subtly as he could with a belly sticking out so far it looked like he had a beach-ball shoved up his jumper, Harry crept down the hall, hoping that Draco wouldn't suddenly appear.

Managing to squeeze into the living room, he shut the door behind him and turned to find Lucius standing at the massive windows. He appeared to be oblivious to Harry's presence, his hands folded behind his back, a pensive, sad look on his face.

It was the same look Harry had seen when he found Lucius watching the fire.

"Lucius?"

Malfoy's eyes closed. "I would rather be alone at the moment, Potter," he said. His voice was quiet. A monotone, completely devoid of emotion.

"What's wrong?"

"Wrong? Nothing. Not a thing."

Chewing on his lip for a moment, Harry took a few steps towards him. "Are...aren't you glad that your son is home?"

Lucius turned slightly to look at him. "You have met my son, Harry, and seen what he is like," he said quietly. "Now, when you know that I am the reason that he is the way that he is, perhaps you can tell me why I would celebrate his homecoming, when all he does is constantly remind me how bad a father I am."

Harry stared at him. "I-I don't understand."

"No. You wouldn't," Lucius turned back to the window, stepping forward and resting his hands on the sill. His eyes scanned out across the grounds and he exhaled a weary sigh. "Perhaps you should be told, though. Draco is the result of my attempts to protect the ones I care most about."

"Eh?"

Lowering his head, Lucius started to speak quietly. "Outside of this family, everyone knows me as the famed Lucius Malfoy. Everyone in our contingent of the wizarding world knows that I am a cruel, sadistic and evil dark wizard," Harry tried to interupt with a protest, but Lucius raised a hand to silence him. "I admit to having an interest in dark magic, but I am - by no means - a dark wizard."

"I-I don't get it."

"I am reaching the point, Harry," Lucius said patiently. "I am not a dark wizard, but people believe that I am, so I act the part, which means I look strong and a potential threat. No one dares to challenge me and, thus, my own family are safe from threat from genuine dark wizards. Everyone sees this mask of mine and accept it as reality... or at least, it was only meant to be people outwith the family who saw me that way." 

"But Draco saw you like that..." Harry whispered, suddenly starting to understand.

"Draco believed that the facade I showed to people outwith our family was the way that a wizard should behave," Turning, the blond-haired man leaned back against the window-ledge, his arms crossed over his chest. He gazed down at the floor. "Nothing I could do or say in the privacy of our home would convince him otherwise. The way I acted in public was good enough for him."

"It isn't your fault."

"Isn't it?" Lucius laughed bitterly. "You have no idea how hard I tried to turn that child around. To teach him decency. Some kind of respect for those who deserved it. You can't know how painful it is to see your own child become the thing you hate most and know that it is all your own fault for molding him that way."

"You tried, Lucius. Some people wouldn't even have done that, " Harry said softly, approaching Lucius and touching his arm in reassurance.

"I tried, yes," the older wizard sighed. "But did I try hard enough? If I really tried, I would have been able to pull him back...you know his...you know Bob and I. You know what we are like and yet, we still manage to raise something like...him."

"Narcissa loves him."

Lucius' face was etched with pain and he pressed his eyes closed. 

"I love the little bastard as well," he said, so quietly that Harry barely heard him. "I hate what he has become. I hate the way he behaves. I hate the way he treats people, but he is still my son and I can't help loving him."

Harry blinked hard, trying to squash down the feelings of immense mushiness that were building up. The father of his baby loved his other child. Lucius Malfoy could love someone, something...

Unfortunately, the surge of maternal pride somehow managed to trigger the instant 'automatic blub' mechanism and before he could think more normal thoughts, tears were pouring down his face.

"I hate being pregnant," he mumbled, groping in his pockets for his grotty tissues.

"You're being strangely quiet," Lucius murmured, looking up from the floor, then shook his head. "Not again!" Harry gave him an apologetic look, although the wizard did look a little...blurry through the tears that were filming his eyes. "For goodness sake, Harry, what is it this time?"

"Do..." he sniffed hard, before he could manage to say. "Do you have a hanky?"

"Of course," Lucius said, as he started to dig through his pockets. "What is it?"

His voice higher-pitched than usual (kind of like Seamus' when he had been kicked in the balls), Harry squeakily replied. "You were being all paternal...you...you said emotional things...and my body is being a right idiot."

Lucius laughed, although it was still slightly strained. "Did I set you off?" he asked, holding out a handkerchief, which Harry took, blasting out a loud honk as tear splashed down his face. "Sorry."

Nodding, he mopped his face. "You should know," he replied, sniffing hard. "That I cry over the stupidest things and when you getting all emotional..."

"You say it's stupid," Lucius said, pointing a finger at him in caution. "And I will wring your neck, pregnant or not."

Scrubbing his cheeks dry with the back of his hand, Harry smiled weakly. "Actually, I was going to say it's sweet," he said, his voice oddly squeaky. A half-smile crossed Lucius' face. "And," Harry added, unable to hide a grin. "Its bloody weird as well!"

"C'mere, you!" 

Reaching out and grabbing Harry by the back of the head, Lucius was laughing as he pulled him into a headlock. 

Harry's futile yells and struggles were quickly replaced by muffled laughter. His wriggling stopped and he leaned against Lucius's chest, the older wizard giving him an affectionate cuff across the head. 

"You have to be the strangest, most insane wizard that I have ever met."

"And this is coming from the man who is married to a transvestite and got two men pregnant?"

There was a chuckle from Lucius. "That is a valid point, although you are more selfless than I. More compassionate."

Shifting slightly to rest the back of his head comfortably against Lucius' shoulder, gazing up at the ceiling, Harry sighed. One of Lucius' arms slid around his waist to hold him steady, his palm spreading on the bump that contained their baby.

"If you don't mind me asking," Lucius said. "Why did my emotional outburst make you cry?"

"Um...no reason..."

"Harry."

Green eyes reluctantly met grey. "I...I thought that you didn't care about him...your son...and that made me scared...it made me scared that you...maybe you wouldn't care about this baby..."

"You know that is probably the most absurd thing you could possibly have thought."

"I know that now," Harry agreed. "But the way you and Draco act around each other, you can't blame me for being worried. I don't even have parents who would have been able to help me if you decided to chuck me out."

Sighing, Lucius rested his temple against Harry's, closing his eyes. His other hand covered Harry's where it was resting on edge of his belly. 

It was strangely comfortable, Harry thought.

There was nothing sexual in it at all. It was just so...nice. 

Lucius' cheek shifted slightly against Harry's, suggesting he was smiling. "I thought you would have realised something about our family by now," The way he said 'our family' made a surge of warmth ripple through Harry's whole body, as if he had just drunk a huge mug of butterbeer. He had a family now. An absurd one, but it was still a family. Something he had never really had before. "Nothing in this family is ever quite as it seems to someone outside."

"Really?" Harry deadpanned. "You think so?"

"Mmm..." Lucius replied lazily. "Would you believe that, on top of the fact that Narcissa is transvestite called Bob, I am actually a woman by the name of Cecillia De Bouffant and Draco is really a limbo-dancing hermaphrodite dwarf called Bong?"

"You know, its worrying, but yes. I would believe that."

Against his back, Lucius' chest shook with silent laughter. "Ciss was right about you when you first arrived here, Harry," he remarked. "You fit on our wavelength far too well for your own safety."

Harry couldn't help grinning. "I think that's possibly the most insulting thing you've ever said to me, you know."

"Are you saying that Ciss and I don't have a normal wavelength."

"Rubber duckies and plastic submarines. I will say no more."

Lucius couldn't hold in his mirth this time, shaking his head. "You are awful, boy. Absolutely terrible. I truly pity this child of ours and hope he has my wit and looks and... well, everything of mine to make him good-looking and charming enough to survive in this world."

"What makes you think its going to be a he?" Harry inquired. "And why are you deluding yourself when you know she's going to look exactly like her...er...well, like me, if I was female."

"Me deluding myself? I'm afraid you're mistaken, boy. Our child will be a boy."

"Girl!"

"Boy!"

"Girl!"

"Boy!"

"GIRL!"

"Guinea pig!"

"Gir..." Harry blinked as he realised what Lucius had said, Lucius started laughing. "Well...that would be a bit of a surprise, wouldn't it?" he remarked dryly. "And if it's a guinea pig, we call it Neville."

"And if it's a girl guinea pig?"

Harry considered it for a long moment, then replied gravely, "Boris. And she'll look just like you."

"What? Stunningly attractive?"

"No. Small and rodenty with too much body hair and a wet nose."


	8. The Right Words

Chapter Eight - The Right Words

"I wish we could have told Draco about you."

"I don't."

"Me either."

Narcissa, toying with her spoon, sighed heavily and looked from her husband to Harry. "I don't know why you can't make an effort to try and like him. He really isn't all that bad."

As usual, for their evening meal, they were sitting in the dining room. Lucius was at one end of the table, Narcissa at the other, with Harry halfway down one side, facing the fireplace in the opposite wall, where a merry fire was crackling.

The subject was, of course, the youngest Malfoy.

"He tried to hex me when my back was turned in fourth year."

"Shows initiative and Slytherin cunning," Narcissa countered.

"He is an obnoxious little twit."

Grey eyes met grey in annoyance. "Learned that from his father."

"Hexed my best friends."

"They probably deserved it."

Lucius smirked and said," Stole your favourite, specially-made silk and leather underwear to sell off in the Slytherin Common room." 

Narcissa's eyes went wide. "He did WHAT!?!?"

"You heard, Ciss," Lucius snickered, smirking. "He's hacked up your favourite knickers without even noticing that they seemed to have a hell of a lot more crotch space than a woman's should..."

Harry was watching Narcissa warily, wondering if it might be safe to try and make a run for freedom.

He had never seen Narcissa truly angry before, but now, her eyes were bulging, her teeth were clenched together in a snarl and her nails were actually gouging large chips out of the surface of the table.

"I had to get MEASURED for those bloody things!" she bellowed, surging to her feet and slamming both palms down on the table. "I'm not having some sleazy French tailor grabbing at my knob again just because my son decides to auction off my bloody underwear without even letting me know if I've made a profit or not!

"Oh, come now, Ciss," Lucius interrupted calmly, an amused glint in his eyes, as he sipped from his cup of black coffee. "Surely Draco isn't all that bad..." 

Harry would have slid under the table and out of sight if his belly had allowed it. 

The fury on Narcissa's face beyond anything he had ever seen before. The only thing that came close was Snape on a bad day and he knew he would face a thousand of Snape's bad days than Narcissa in a rage.

"Dear Narcissa," A new and altogether horribly familiar voice murmured from the shadows of the room. The trio at the table went rigid. "Always so attached to the little things, aren't you, pretty one?"

Harry looked wildly down the table at Lucius, who had gone white as a sheet. The cup he was holding slipped from his hand, shattering deafeningly on the floor, chips of ceramic bouncing on the stone.

"And Lucius, my friend, it has been quite some time since we have had the pleasure of your company at our...gatherings."

Crapcrapcrapcrap...

This couldn't be happening.

Why did he have to show up? 

Why couldn't he have just gone and...

Harry couldn't imagine something that the Dark Lord could have done instead of appearing in the Malfoys' home, but anything that meant he was away from Harry's new family... 

Lucius gestured with a shaking hand for him to hide under the table, before he was noticed and he nodded, swallowing hard as he tried to suck in his stomach and slip down in his chair.

From his hiding place, he saw the figure gliding forward from the shadows in an utterly terrifying fashion, clothed in dark robes that pooled around his feet like puddles of black silk. 

To anyone else, it would have been terrifying.

Unfortunately, Harry couldn't help remembering half the things that the Malfoys had told him.

Pink lacy thong.

Rolled up gym sock.

Distinct lack in manly parts.

Girly squeal when accosted by pregnant muggles.

He tried not to laugh out loud, he really tried.

Unfortunately, the pregnancy seemed to be taking his normal emotions and reactions and putting them up to full power and he had to stuff a fist in his mouth before the choked giggles would stop.

Grabbing the corner of his robes, Harry hastily stuffed it into his mouth and tried to convince himself that this was a serious situation, in spite of tears of laughter that were rolling down his face, his body shaking with the force of his mirth.

He couldn't even stop laughing when a he saw something slithering across the floor towards him.

Nagini, Voldemort's pet snake, the creature who had once terrified him.

It was slithering towards him, a wicked look in it's eye and it was...

Harrry let loose a great peal of laughter, unable to hold it in anymore.

Rocking back and forward, his stomach aching from trying to keep his amusement silent, Harry pointed at the snake and simply cracked up all over again, rolling onto his side and slapping his hand on the floor.

Everything was just so absurdly funny!

He had completely forgotten that only he and Voldemort could understand the snake and right now, he was the only one that could hear Nagini whistling a badly-out-of-tune and utterly bastardised version of the Great Escape theme.

The robed figure by the table bent at the waist and peered under the table, scarlet eyes going wide with undisguised surprise.

Harry took one look at Voldemort's startled face and burst out laughing, pointing at the Dark Wizard.

Everything was hilarious! 

It was great!

"Lucius," he heard Voldemort hiss. Oh God! He hissed! He sounded like a badly made kettle! How bloody funny was that! "Would you be kind enough to inform me what Harry Potter is doing under your table?"

Dying of laughter, Harry mentally yelled for Lucius to reply. 

"I-I...Harry Potter, master?"

"Yes, Lucius," Voldemort repeated. "Harry Potter. He is rolling about on the floor under your dining room table with his robes in his mouth and seems to be having some kind of psychotic episode."

Lucius and Narcissa both peered under the table at him and Harry wished he could have stopped laughing long enough to actually tell them what was so funny. They, though, looked absolutely petrified.

"Looks like you're going to have to come out, Harry," Lucius muttered, stretching out a hand, which Harry managed to take a hold of on his third attempt, still shaking with uncontrollable giggles.

Helped to his feet unsteadily by the Malfoys, he pressed his lips together in a vain attempt to smother his amusement but couldn't stop sniggering as Voldemort slowly approached him.

"Harry Potter..."

"You remember my name! Well done!"

Whatever Voldemort had been expecting, it certainly wasn't that. Red eyes narrowed a little.

"Would you be so kind as to inform me what you are doing here?"

Harry, swallowing a giggle, smiled broadly. "No."

"Harry..." Lucius whispered urgently. "Don't do anything stupid."

It was the terrified tone in his substitute father's voice that made Harry realise just how frightened Lucius and Narcissa were for him. They thought...they thought he was going to die tonight.

"I'm afraid its a little late for that, Malfoy," Voldemort murmured, his eyes never leaving Harry's face. His wand, though, was turned to Lucius. "But first, perhaps we should remind you were your loyalties lie, Lucius."

Harry's hand snapped up and grabbed Voldemort's wrist. "I wouldn't do that if I were you, dinky dick," he said with a oddly manic smile.

Voldemort's already white face went a shade paler. "How did you...?" Scarlet eyes turned to Lucius. "You," he hissed. "_Crucio_!" 

Lucius screamed as he was hit by the curse, crashing onto the floor.

Then Voldemort screamed as he was kicked - hard - in the almost non-existent nads, doubling over and dropping his wand.

"Told you I wouldn't do that if I were you, small balls," Harry said in a low growl, green eyes flashing. "Nobody hurts Lucius Malfoy. Nobody, do you hear me? Not you, not his ungrateful bastard of a son! NOBODY! I told you not to touch him and what did you go and do? You only went and put the bloody torture curse on him! And here we were, meant to believe that you were smart and you can't even take basic instructions!" Red eyes squinted at him in utter confusion. "Nobody touches the father of my baby!"

With a very feeble squeak, hands still clutched to his groin, Voldemort dropped onto his knees.

"And you!" Harry yelled at Nagini, who had changed theme tunes and was trying to for Dambusters. "Would you stop that bloody whistling! You're going the right way for a smacked bottom!" The snake curled up in a sulky ball under the table. "Lucius? Are you all right?"

"You kicked him in the nuts..."

Harry grinned. "I just imagined it was you and gave myself a larger target."

Lucius went crimson. "I knew that bloody submarine wasn't big en..." His eyes were looking beyond Harry. "Harry!"

"You..." Turning, Harry started when the tip of Voldemort's wand jabbed against his chest. "I should have done this...years ago, boy...Avada..."

"Oh no, you bloody well don't!" Harry snapped, slapping the wand away, a haze of red dropping in front of his eyes. "Just because you have no life and got yourself fried because you like killing babies and then spend all this time pissing about and moaning about your inability to kill me doesn't mean I'm just going to stand here like a fanny and take it when you finally come face to face with me!"

Voldemort blinked at him, then tried again. "Avad..."

"What part of 'No, you don't' did you just miss, you bloody willyless tit-sucker?"

Tit-sucker? 

Harry, what are you on about, mate?

At least learn some proper cusses before you try and insult the Dark Lord guy.

"Look, will you just stay still so I can kill you already?" Again, Voldemort's wand came up. "Ava..."

"LOOK yourself!" Harry slapped Voldemort across the top of his head as vehement exclamation. "I've had it up to hear with you trying to bloody well kill me!" SLAP! "If you had done things the old-fashioned way," SLAP! "With a machine gun," SLAP! "Or even a bloody knife," SLAP! "I wouldn't have had half as traumatic a life as I've had already!"

SLAPSLAPSLAP!

"Stop that! I'm trying to kill you!"

"You're doing a bloody brilliant job of it," SLAP "Aren't you," SLAP "You snake-faced," SLAP! "Sock-stuffed-thong-wearing," SLAP! "Guinea pig?" SLAPSLAPSLAP!

"Stoppit!"

"What?" Harry yelled hysterically, slapping Voldemort several times across the head with both hands for good measure and wondering briefly if his wrists looked as limp as they seemed to. "Stop this? I don't want to stop this! I like doing this! And its making your head go pink! Did you know that? Your head is going pink!"

Why, he wondered, did he slap like a girl when he was wound up like this?

And what the hell was he babbling about?

Pink? Who gave a crap of it was pink?

Waitaminute...Voldemort...pink thong...

The laughter hit him again like a physical blow.

The wand was pointed at him again.

"Don't you even think about trying that again, you great big poopoohead!" Harry screeched, grabbing the wand and hurling it straight into the fireplace, where it was devoured by the flames. "And you ruined my fun, you wanker!"

"NOOOOOOOOOOO!" Voldemort screamed, lunging forwards to try and retrieve his wand, only to get yanked back by a very irate, very flushed and very hormonally-charged Harry Potter.

"What is this?" Harry demanded, kicking the Dark Lord in the shin. "Star Wars?"

"Get off! Get away!"

Voldemort wriggled free and tried to flee, but Harry chased after him, waddling faster than any pregnant person the Malfoys had seen before, slapping at Voldemort and shrieking, "Hallo! My name is Harry Potter! You killed my father! And my mother! And apparently my uncle Gordon, cousin Leanne, aunt Doris and various miscellaneous other family members too! Prepare to die!"

Leaning on Narcissa several paces away, Lucius grinned at his wife. "We should have sold tickets for this. We would have made a bloody mint," he said, as Harry enthusiastically bitch-slapped the squealing Voldemort around the room.

"Poopoohead! Willyless wonder! Doofus! Dorkhead!"

Narcissa winced. "We would probably have made more if the boy knew some proper insults, though," she said, helping Lucius to his feet. Both of them stepped back as Voldemort tried to flee in the other direction. "You all right, Luce?"

"Of course," He grinned. "Now, how about we leave Harry and his...friend to play?"

"NO!" A black-robed blur sped in front of them before they could move. Voldemort was on his knees in front of Lucius and Narcissa, grabbing at their robes with wild-eyed desperation. "Don't leave me here! Not with him!"

"Lucius," Harry said, standing on the other side of the room, a very wicked glimmer in his eyes. "Perhaps, before you leave, you can prompt my...special friend to say the right words....?"

"Right words...?"

Harry nodded slowly, a smile creeping onto his lips, his eyes slitted.

Helping Voldemort onto his feet, Lucius dusted him down. "He'll let you out of here, if you know what to say to him, Master," he muttered to the Dark Lord, who nodded, staring wildly at Harry. "He's looking remarkably slim nowadays, wouldn't you say?"

Voldemort stared at Lucius, then at Harry, as if they were both crazy which - given the circumstances - might have been a fairly accurate assessment.

"What are you talking about, Malfoy?" he demanded bitterly. "The boy looks like a beached whale! He's bloody enormous! I haven't seen anyone that fat in ages!"

Releasing Voldemort's arm, Lucius quickly backed away with Narcissa. "That may be true, boss," he called as they made a break for the door, not even daring to look in Harry's direction. "But he's also pregnant!"

The look of sheer terror on Voldemort's face was priceless as they closed the door on him and Harry's scream shook the walls of Malfoy Manor.

"HOW DARE YOU SAY I'M FAT!"

***

Thus ended the muchly evil and naughty-filled life of Tom Riddle, aka the dark Lord Voldemort aka da dinky dick meister (only to his close friends, though), bitchslapped to his all too timely death by the famous Harry Potter.

And there was much rejoicing.

Yey.

And the lesson of this part of our tale - NEVER, if you value your sanity and your hide, tell a pregnant hormonal timebomb that they look fat.


	9. Labouring A Point

Chapter Nine - Labouring a Point

"Ciss..."

Swatting at the hand that was poking her repeatedly, Narcissa grumbled, rolling over onto her back, legs akimbo, eyes crossed beneath half-closed lids. "Go 'way..." she groaned in her normal voice, which clashed rather violently with her hairnet and nightdress. "Sleeping."

"You can't be sleeping...not now...I'm having a bloody baby..."

"Eh?"

"Want it the hard way?" the voice said. "BOB! I'M HAVING A BLOODY BABY!"

Jerking upright in bed, her head swimming Narcissa swayed unsteadily, one hand coming to her forehead as she squinted around the dimly-lit bedroom and found Harry glaring down at her. "Whu?"

The numerous celebration parties for Voldemort's demise had gone on well into the night of his defeat and for three and a half days afterwards, so it was hardly surprising that Narcissa was having a little trouble getting up and about.

Or even conscious for that matter.

After all, there were only so many variations on combinations of whisky and shandy that could be downed before it got to the stage of simply knocking back the booze straight from the bottle.

"Are you awake, Ciss?" he said, waving a hand in front of her face. She giggled. She had never noticed Harry had twenty fingers on one hand before. "Ciss, hello? Can you hear me?"

Nodding drowsily, she smiled blearily up at him. "You're coming in loud and clear, Captain!" she agreed, trying to salute him and only succeeding slapping herself rather hard on the forehead.

"I think the baby wants out," he said. "Now."

"Baby?" The words registered and her eyes popped wide open. "Oh buggeration and crap with a cherry on top!"

"Not quite the way I'd put it," Harrry winced as he sat down on the edge of the bed, one hand pressing against his stomach. "It hurts, Ciss...and you never told me...how do I get this thing out of me with no hole?"

Narcissa, scrambling across her bed to grab her dressing gown gave him a helpless look. "You stay in labour until your body thinks you've suffered as much as a woman would normally and then your belly button opens up and lets the baby out."

Grimacing, Harry pressed his eyes shut. 

"And now," he muttered grimly. "I know why you didn't bother to tell me this beforehand. Is there anything else I should know about this before I decide to go and avada myself?"

"Um..."

"Ciss?"

"Painkilling spells don't work," she mumbled, sliding her feet into her slippers.

"What do you mean they...don't work?"

"I mean they don't work," she answered apologetically. "The theory is if you wanted a baby enough to get the potion, you have to be able to take the pain that goes with it and now..."

Slowly lying back on the bed, his eyes pressed closed, Harry winced as another pain lanced through his stomach. "Remind me to kill Lucius," he said dryly. "Or castrate him. Whichever is easi...ow...owowowowow!"

"Painful?"

Green eyes opened and glared at her, as he struggled to sit back up again. "No, Ciss, not at all." Harry replied in a voice dripping sarcasm. "I thought I would practise my singing. What do you think?"

"Lowest form of wit, dear," Narcissa chastised, helping him back onto his feet, an arm going around his waist. He gave her a dirty look, gritting his teeth as they started back towards his room. "What?"

"When you're feeling this, then you can lecture me on sarcasm."

"Been there, done that, got the T-shirt," Narcissa replied smugly.

"T-shirt...right..."

"Actually, I do," she grinned at him engagingly. "It has a picture of Draco on it and his weight, time of birth and everything...I was going to wear it when you went into labour so you couldn't gripe and moan about how no one understands the pain you're going through."

"Bitch," Harry moaned. "You're just a bitch..."

"That's the nicest thing you've ever said about me!"

Harry glared at her. "I didn't mean it that way," he muttered, pausing as another stabbing pain struck him low in his abdomen, doubling him over. "Oh crap! Oh crap! Oh CRAP!"

"Easy, Harry, breathe..." Narcissa directed him to the wall, letting him bend over, rubbing his back as he sucked in deep, gulping breaths of air. "Good boy, Harry, just keep calm..."

"How could Mrs Weasley do this seven times?" Harry mumbled, shaking his head as he gripped the decorating panels of the wall for support. "I don't understand...this is bad enough for me...and she went back for more...she must be bloody mad..."

"It'll be over soon enough, Harry."

"You promise?" Green eyes turned to her plaintively. 

"Er..."

Harry whimpered. "This isn't fair..."

***

"IT HURTS!"

"Just try and stay calm, Harry!"

"To hell with calm!" Harry yelled hoarsely, kicking one of the house elves across the room on a reflex action. "I want this thing out of me! I want it out! Now! Get it out! make the pain go away!"

Back on his own bed, Narcissa keeping tabs on any sign of his navel opening up to allow the baby out, Harry's face was shining with sweat, his hands bunching into the sheets underneath him.

Sponging his face, she had been trying to reassure him and received a tirade of abuse that she recognised well from her own labour, nearly eighteen years before.

"What's going on?"

Narcissa and Harry both looked towards the door, relief on their faces.

"Luce! Thank the Founders you made it back!" Narcissa exclaimed, standing up quickly and motioning him forwards. "Harry went into labour last night! It's been going for nearly eight hours and he's not..." 

"BLOODY HELL! Lucius, when this is over, I'm ripping your bloody knob off!"

Lucius gave Narcissa an amused look. "That well, eh, Ciss? I remember you saying something along the same lines," he remarked dryly, peeling off his outer robes and approaching the bed. "Do you want me to do the 'father' thing, Harry?" 

Green eyes stared at him wildly. "You put this thing in me and you better be here when it comes out, you bloody bastard!"

"If I had known, I would have ignored the summons from Dumbledore..."

"Dumbledore?" Harry panted, struggling to sit up a little, sheets of sweat spilling down his face. "What did he want?"

Sliding onto the bed behind Harry, placing himself between Harry's body and the headboard, Lucius let the younger man press his bare back against his chest and grip his hands for support. "He just wanted to know what exactly happened and how you were getting on."

Panting and shaking, Harry clutched tightly at Lucius' reassuringly firm, dry hands as another surge of pain hit him, pushing back against the older wizard. "And what did you tell him?"

"Oh, the truth," Lucius replied.

"The truth?"

"Mmm. My version thereof."

Relaxing a little, his breathing evening out, Harry tilted his head. "Which is?"

"That our Master," Lucius said in his severest of tones, his expression serious. "The dearly departed Lord Voldemort somehow spontaneously combusted in shock when he actually saw that mysterious willy which has been seen flying around the Oxford countryside in recent months."

Harry started laughing, then groaned. "Don't make me laugh, you git! It hurts!"

"Poor little boy," Lucius snickered, propping his chin on top of Harry's head. "I always knew that Gryffindors had low pain threshholds."

Unseen by him, Narcissa and Harry exchanged glances.

"Right, Lucius," Harry muttered. "Next time, you carry the baby."

"I think not."

"And why not, Luce?" Narcissa inquired. "After all, it would only be fair and then we would have one each!"

"Absolutely and vehemently not."

Harry's hands clenched around Lucius' as pain struck again. The muscles in his lean arms and torso were taut, his face going from white to scarlet in a matter of seconds, his eyes pressed shut in pain.

"How about..." he gritted out between clenched teeth. "I just kick you...in the nuts... once every day...for the next six months...that would maybe match you...to this kind of pain..." 

"Amateur," Narcissa laughed. "You really do have to learn how to threaten people properly, Harry."

"Ciss, just tell me...is it coming out yet...?"

Leaning in, Narcissa gave him a broad smile. "Looks like you're about to become a daddy...or both of you are about to become daddies..." A bemused look crossed her face. "You know, this is going to be one disturbed child."

"And you have a totally normal relationship with your son," Harry groaned, his head falling back against Lucius' shoulder, gasps of pain tearing from his throat as his navel slowly started to open outwards. "IT HURTS!"

"I never said it wouldn't, dear," Narcissa replied primly. "And don't you insult my relationship with my little boy!"

"I didn't insult it...you're a man...and your son doesn't know...just pointing it out..."

"Would you two please stop bickering," Lucius sighed. "Ciss, check on that hole and see how quickly it's opening. Harry, just keep your breathing nice and steady, all right? It might sound stupid, but it helps."

"You'll let me kick your arse when this is over, won't you?" Harry said pleadingly, looking up at Lucius.

Lucius gave him a half-smile. "I'll consider it."

"All right, Harry, this is it..."

Pressing his head back against Lucius' shoulder, Harry squeezed his eyes shut, tears mingling with the sweat on his face. "Oh God..." he whispered under his breath over and over again. "Oh God, Oh God, Oh God..."

It felt like he was being torn apart, like someone had rammed a great metal fist into his belly and was slowly drawing his innards out.

It was excruciating.

And the sounds.

He could hear a slurping squishing sound which seemed to be matched up with the pressure of what had to be Narcissa's hands trying to release the baby - oh my God! I'm actually having a baby! - from his insides.

Shudders rocketed through his body and he felt Lucius reassuringly squeezing his fingers in silent support.

"Good boy, Harry...good boy..."

The repetitive whispers seemed to soothe him somewhat, as he tried to force the pain from his consciousness.

It would be over soon.

It would be all over.

No more peeing night and day.

No more cravings or morning sickness.

But, best of all, no more belly!

"Merlin..." 

He heard Lucius' whisper and forced his eyes open, his throat tight with pain, in time to see Narcissa draw a squirming, wailing, slime-covered creature out of the hole where his belly button had once been.

Of course, then he saw his large intestine.

Green eyes went round and wide as he stared into his own guts and the famous Harry Potter, vanquisher of Lord Voldemort and all around good guy and everything else heroic, promptly fainted dead away. 


	10. Three Men & A Little Lady

Three Men And A Little Lady

"Harry," A hand was lightly slapping his face. "Harry, wake up."

Green eyes slowly fluttered open, the room swimming in Harry's fuzzy line of sight again. Sunlight was streaming in through the windows to his right and the house elves who had been there earlier had vanished.

"Nugh..." he mumbled, slowly becoming aware that he was leaning against someone, gradually piecing together that it was probably still Lucius, and something warm, wriggling and damp had been placed on his chest.

"Look, Harry," he heard Lucius speak softly in his ear. "Look."

Squinting down at his chest, the lenses of his glasses flecked with sweat, he blinked in astonishment. "It..." His throat constricted, tears filling his eyes, as he lifted a hand and touched the tiny creature. "Its a baby."

"Your powers of observation astound me, boy," Lucius chuckled, one of his hands slipping free from Harry's to rise, brushing the boy dark, sweat-slicked hair back from his forehead.

Struggling to sit up a little, with help from both Narcissa and Lucius, Harry carefully brought his hands up to cradle the tiny, squirming creature. He was shaking, he noticed, as he turned the baby in his arms.

"Here," Narcissa, as tearful as Harry, leaned forward and adjusted the baby in his arms, so it's head was snugly resting in the crook of his elbow. Tucking a blanket around it, she raised her eyes. "We...you have a little girl."

Harry barely even registered her words, staring down at the child.

He had never seen anything quite as incredible as this little one.

She was the most beautiful, perfect thing he had ever seen.

Touching the tiny being's rosy hand, tears broke from his eyes, as her perfect little fingers curled around one of his, squeezing with a strength that he never knew a baby could have.

Babies weren't meant to look like this one.

They were meant to have screwed up, shining red faces and be wrinkly and ugly, screaming and wailing. There weren't meant to have cherubic little faces and large, blinking green eyes just like his and the most adorable little nose Harry had ever seen.

"She's perfect," he whispered.

Narcissa slipped a bottle into his hand. "You might need to use this," she said. "With your rather...er...distinct lack in the mammary region."

"Eh?"

"Tits," Lucius replied in his ear. "Or your lack thereof."

"But I wanted to breast feed like a normal woman!" Harry exclaimed, then paused, a puzzled expression crossing his face. "Wait a second...that didn't come out quite like I intended it to..."

"Clearly," Lucius chuckled, squeezing Harry's shoulder. "I'll let you off this time and say it's the fatigue talking. After all, you were in labour for eight hours, so I could hardly blame you for being tired."

"Mmm."

His attention back on his...

OH MY GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWD!

"I have a bloody baby!"

"Again, such astute observation."

"I have a little girl!"

"Makes you wonder why he wasn't top of his class with wit and observation skills like this," Narcissa grinned mischievously.

Giving her a dirty look, Harry watched with fascination as the baby took the teat of the bottle in her perfect little mouth and started to suck vigourously, trickles of milk formula dribbling from the corners of her mouth. "What are we going to call her?"

"I believe you said something about Neville or Boris..."

"That was for a Guinea-pig," Harry corrected absently, taking in everything about the tiny being in his arms.

"Guinea pig?" Narcissa asked, looking a little puzzled.

Harry nodded. "We thought it was going to be a guinea-pig," he replied drowsily, his eyes fixed on the baby lying so neatly in his arms. She was so small. She barely even weighed as much as a Quaffle!

Her little face was rosy, but not too red, her tiny hands curled in fists beside her head, which was covered in a downy layer of silver-blonde hair, so pale that it was barely visible.

"You could always call her Narcissa after a female friend who happened to deliver her," Narcissa suggested with a wide smile.

"Ah, yes," Lucius replied. "But since that female friend is actually really a man, it rather detracts from the appeal of the name, knowing its a stage name for the best transvestite in the business, dear." 

"Flattery all the way, eh, Luce?"

"Anything to stop you naming our daughter after you, Ciss."

"How about Lily?" Harry lifted his eyes to them.

"Lily?" Lucius seemed to measure the way the name sounded. "Lily Malfoy. Yes... I do rather like that..."

"Ahem? Why not Lily Potter?"

Lucius gave him a patient look. "Do you really want to world to think you got my wife knocked up to produce a baby with this colouring? At least this way, no one would question her origins."

"Ah...good point..."

"You gave her her name, the name she will grow into, though" Lucius added, seeing the disappointed look that flooded Harry's exhausted face. "I just gave her a high-quality designer-wizard label to work under."

"Eh?"

There was a laugh from Narcissa. "Lily Malfoy, daughter of Lucius Malfoy, will be rich and everyone will know it as well. Rich, powerful, famous...no doubt good-looking judging by her daddies."

"Well, if I decided to raise her as a single parent," Harry sniffed. "She would be rich anyway. I'm not exactly a poor workhouse kid."

"I knew there was a reason I liked you, Potter," Lucius smirked at the indignant expression on Harry's face. "I assume, though, that you will be remaining with us to raise our daughter?"

"I suppose I could always force myself," he replied, with a heavy sigh. "Although... can I tell my friends? I mean, about why I had to leave school and about Lily?" He looked down at the baby. "I want them to know."

Lucius and Narcissa exchanged looks. 

"Its up to you, Ciss."

Narcissa pursed her lips in thought. "I'll agree to it," she said after a great deal of thought. "As long as they meet me as Bob, instead of Narcissa, and as long as you manage to fix up a date with that nice red-haired bloke."

"Red-haired bloke?" Lucius started. "What do you mean red-haired bloke, Ciss?"

Narcissa smiled sweetly. "You love me, don't you, Lucius?"

"Like syphilis," he replied equally sweetly, although his smile was considerably less sweet. "Who is this red-haired bloke? And if you are even considering dating a Weasley, I WILL divorce you! I'll fake your signature if I have to."

"You don't like the Weasleys?"

Lucius scowled at them both. "Ever since Arthur Weasley put chewing gum in my hair when we were at nursery together," he replied, glowering as Narcissa and Harry both started laughing. "It wasn't funny! They had to shave my head!"

"Of course it wasn't funny, Lucius, dear," Narcissa giggled. "I was there. It really wasn't funny at all..." Leaning closer to Harry, she whispered in a low voice. "It was bloody hilarious!"

Despite the sulky look on his face, Lucius couldn't hide the happy glint in his eyes as Harry and Narcissa laughed together, both of them cooing over the baby tucked between them.

It was possibly the oddest scene he could imagine, he mused.

Here he was, tucked comfortably behind Harry Potter on a four-poster-bed, the half-dressed teenager cradling their baby and his own cross-dressing wife, curled up beside Harry as if they had been a three-part family all the time.

And yet, he wouldn't change it for the world.

***

"You can't be serious!"

With Lily resting against his shoulder as he rubbed her back, Harry gave Hermione an exasperated look. "I didn't say it just to make Ron faint from shock, you know," he said, bringing Lily back down into his arms. 

"You mean to say that you were pregnant? With a baby? It's impossible!"

Harry rolled his eyes ceilingwards. "Hermione, I'm holding the bloody baby now, aren't I?"

"Its impossible!" she repeated stubbornly. "A man can't get pregnant."

"I did."

Hermione looked up at the smiling face of Bob, who was standing behind Harry's chair, his hands spread on the back. "I don't know who you are, sir, but I...I just can't believe it's possible."

"Believe it, sweets," Bob answered. "And you do know who I am."

"Er..."

"Go on, sweetie," Bob prompted Harry, grinning widely. "I love to see the look on their faces when someone tells them."

"Tells them...what, exactly?"

"Hermione, Ron," Harry waited until Ron - who had just fainted four times in rapid succession - got off the floor and was sitting beside the brown-haired witch again. "I'd like you to meet Bob, also known as Narcissa Malfoy, Draco's mother."

"G-noo..." Ron gulped, then fainted again.

"You...you mean you're a woman in drag?"

"No, cupcake," Bob replied cheerfully. "One hundred percent male arse here with a tendency to look good in dresses."

Hermione went a funny shade of grey-green and looked like she was about to join Ron on the floor in a very confused heap of gloop. "You mean you...you really had a baby, Harry?"

"And defeated Voldemort with her help."

"How?" Hermione's voice had shrunk to a tiny squeak.

"Let me tell her!" Lucius interrupted eagerly from the window-sill. Harry, grinning at the memory, nodded. "Voldemort told Harry that he looked fat and Harry bitch-slapped him to death!" 

Hermione's eyes went round. "Oh...my...god..."

"I think that's everything, isn't it?"

Harry nodded. "We've covered Voldemort's defeat by bitch-slap, the fact that I've had a baby and they are going to be the God parents, how I had a baby, what we plan to do, convinced them that you aren't going to kill me..."

"I don't believe it..." Ron mumbled, picking himself off the floor again. "My first God-child...with Harry and Malfoy Senior as parents...I don't think my day could get any weirder than this..."

"OH!" Bob squealed. "Oh, Harry! Ask him! You have to ask him!" 

"Ask me...what?" Ron inquired, nervously licking his lips at the hyperactive tone in Bob's voice.

"Ron, Bob fancies your brother. They met at the Wonky Wand, but Bob was too shy to ask for a date..." Ron was on the floor again, in a dead faint. "Maybe," Harry mused aloud. "He didn't know Bill was gay..."

"Or he didn't know I was a man," Bob added helpfully.

Harry grinned. "That too."

***

"Well, it went better than I expected," Harry admitted.

After Ron had been dragged out of unconsciousness for the tenth time and had been obliviated for his own sake, he and Hermione had departed, leaving the little family to settle down.

In the living room, Lucius was sitting, reading the Daily Prophet on the couch in front of the massive fireplace, with Harry semi-snuggled against his side, their baby asleep in Harry's arms. 

Narcissa, meanwhile, was sitting on a pillow on the floor in front of the couch, playing solitaire and specifically ignoring any of the moves that her husband and Harry were suggesting.

"I never imagined your friend would be so shocked by the concept," Lucius said.

"Who, Hermione?"

"Well, both of them. They did always appear so...receptive to magic."

Harry nodded, stroking Lily's hair. "I suppose they never had to deal with anything quite like this before, though."

Both of them looked down at the baby and smiled.

However, the nostalgia of the moment was shattered went the front door was flung open and they heard a very familiar voice shouting. 

"MOTHER! FATHER!"

Lucius closed his eyes with a groan. "And we forgot to mention to them not to tell Draco about any of it, didn't we?"

Behind them, the door of the living room was opened and Draco stormed in, looking rather...mussed and shaken. 

"Father!" he exclaimed, clearly unable to see Harry or his mother over the high back of the couch. "Weasley has been spreading the most disgusting lies about..." His words trailed off as he rounded the couch and saw Harry, lazing there, smirking, a small and very Malfoy baby curled against his chest, asleep. "F-father...? Mother?"

Narcissa placed her last card down, then looked up at her son.

"Draco, darling, we have something we need to tell you..."

***

And - in Australia - thousands of people were woken in the middle of the night by an anguished screech of "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

And back in Britain, they all lived happily ever after, except annoying-brat Draco, who having broken his father's heart, THEN finding out the truth was put in a mental asylum for several years and was constantly heard gibbering to himself about his mother for some absurd reason. 

After his release, he rejoined his family and THEN, they all lived happily ever after, especially Lily, who had four very handsome and dashing fathers by the time she was five, as Bob and Bill settled down together.

Thus concludes the tale of Harry Potter and the Daughter of Malfoy.

THE END


End file.
